THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 


The 

Damnation  of  Theron  Ware 
or  Illumination 


NEW    YORK 
STONE  esf  KIMBALL 

MDCCCXCVII 


COPYRIGHT,  1896,  BY 
STONE    AND    KIMBALL 


FIRST  EDITION  MARCH    1896 
SECOND  EDITION  JUNE   1896 
THIRD  EDITION   SEPTEMBER   1896 
FOURTH   EDITION  SEPTEMBER   1896 
FIFTH  EDITION  NOVEMBER   1896 
SIXTH  EDITION   DECEMBER   1896 


TS 

no? 


PART    I 


CHAPTER   I 

No  such  throng  had  ever  before  been  seen  in 
the  building  during  all  its  eight  years  of  exist 
ence.  People  were  wedged  together  most  un 
comfortably  upon  the  seats;  they  stood  packed 
in  the  aisles  and  overflowed  the  galleries ;  at  the 
back,  in  the  shadows  underneath  these  galleries, 
they  formed  broad,  dense  masses  about  the  doors, 
through  which  it  would  be  hopeless  to  attempt  a 
passage. 

The  light,  given  out  from  numerous  tin-lined 
circles  of  flaring  gas-jets  arranged  on  the  ceiling, 
fell  full  upon  a  thousand  uplifted  faces,  —  some 
framed  in  bonnets  or  juvenile  curls,  others  bearded 
or  crowned  with  shining  baldness,  —  but  all  alike 
under  the  spell  of  a  dominant  emotion  which  held 
features  in  abstracted  suspense  and  focussed  every 
eye  upon  a  common  objective  point. 

The  excitement  of  expectancy  reigned  upon 
each  row  of  countenances,  was  visible  in  every 
attitude,  —  nay,  seemed  a  part  of  the  close,  over 
heated  atmosphere  itself. 

5 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

An  observer,  looking  over  these  compact  lines 
of  faces  and  noting  the  uniform  concentration  of 
eagerness  they  exhibited,  might  have  guessed  that 
they  were  watching  for  either  the  jury's  verdict  in 
some  peculiarly  absorbing  criminal  trial,  or  the  an 
nouncement  of  the  lucky  numbers  in  a  great  lottery. 
These  two  expressions  seemed  to  alternate,  and 
even  to  mingle  vaguely,  upon  the  upturned  linea 
ments  of  the  waiting  throng,  —  the  hope  of  some 
unnamed  stroke  of  fortune  and  the  dread  of  some 
adverse  decree. 

But  a  glance  forward  at  the  object  of  this  uni 
versal  gaze  would  have  sufficed  to  shatter  both 
hypotheses.  Here  was  neither  a  court  of  justice 
nor  a  tombola.  It  was  instead  the  closing  session 
of  the  annual  Nedahma  Conference  of  the  Metho 
dist  Episcopal  Church,  and  the  Bishop  was  about 
to  read  out  the  list  of  ministerial  appointments  for 
the  coming  year.  This  list  was  evidently  written 
in  a  hand  strange  to  him,  and  the  slow,  near 
sighted  old  gentleman,  having  at  last  sufficiently 
rubbed  the  glasses  of  his  spectacles,  and  then 
adjusted  them  over  his  nose  with  annoying  delib 
eration,  was  now  silently  rehearsing  his  task  to 
himself,  —  the  while  the  clergymen  round  about 
ground  their  teeth  and  restlessly  shuffled  their 
feet  in  impatience. 

Upon  a  closer  inspection  of  the  assemblage, 
there  were  a  great  many  of  these  clergymen.  A 
dozen  or  more  dignified,  and  for  the  most  part 

6 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

elderly,  brethren  sat  grouped  about  the  Bishop 
in  the  pulpit.  As  many  others,  not  quite  so 
staid  in  mien,  and  indeed  with  here  and  there 
almost  a  suggestion  of  frivolity  in  their  postures, 
were  seated  on  the  steps  leading  down  from 
this  platform.  A  score  of  their  fellows  sat  facing 
the  audience,  on  chairs  tightly  wedged  into  the 
space  railed  off  round  the  pulpit ;  and  then 
came  five  or  six  rows  of  pews,  stretching  across 
the  whole  breadth  of  the  church,  and  almost 
solidly  filled  with  preachers  of  the  Word. 

There  were  very  old  men  among  these,  —  bent 
and  decrepit  veterans  who  had  known  Lorenzo 
Dow,  and  had  been  ordained  by  elders  who 
remembered  Francis  Asbury  and  even  Whitefield. 
They  sat  now  in  front  places,  leaning  forward  with 
trembling  and  misshapen  hands  behind  their  hairy 
ears,  waiting  to  hear  their  names  read  out  on  the 
superannuated  list,  it  might  be  for  the  last  time. 

The  sight  of  these  venerable  Fathers  in  Israel 
was  good  to  the  eyes,  conjuring  up,  as  it  did,  pic 
tures  of  a  time  when  a  plain  and  homely  people 
had  been  served  by  a  fervent  and  devoted  clergy, 
—  by  preachers  who  lacked  in  learning  and  polish, 
no  doubt,  but  who  gave  their  lives  without  dream 
of  earthly  reward  to  poverty  and  to  the  danger  and 
wearing  toil  of  itinerant  missions  through  the  rude 
frontier  settlements.  These  pictures  had  for  their 
primitive  accessories  log-huts,  rough  household  im 
plements,  coarse  clothes,  and  patched  old  saddles 

7 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

which  told  of  weary  years  of  journeying ;  but  to 
even  the  least  sympathetic  vision  there  shone 
upon  them  the  glorified  light  of  the  Cross  and 
Crown.  Reverend  survivors  of  the  heroic  times, 
their  very  presence  there  —  sitting  meekly  at  the 
altar-rail  to  hear  again  the  published  record  of 
their  uselessness  and  of  their  dependence  upon 
church  charity  —  was  in  the  nature  of  a  bene 
diction. 

The  large  majority  of  those  surrounding  these 
patriarchs  were  middle-aged  men,  generally  of  a 
robust  type,  with  burly  shoulders,  and  bushing 
beards  framing  shaven  upper  lips,  and  who  looked 
for  the  most  part  like  honest  and  prosperous 
farmers  attired  in  their  Sunday  clothes.  As  ex 
ceptions  to  this  rule,  there  were  scattered  stray 
specimens  of  a  more  urban  class,  worthies  with 
neatly  trimmed  whiskers,  white  neckcloths,  and 
even  indications  of  hair-oil, —  all  eloquent  of  citi 
fied  charges ;  and  now  and  again  the  eye  singled 
out  a  striking  and  scholarly  face,  at  once  strong 
and  simple,  and  instinctively  referred  it  to  the 
faculty  of  one  of  the  several  theological  semi 
naries  belonging  to  the  Conference. 

The  effect  of  these  faces  as  a  whole  was  toward 
goodness,  candor,  and  imperturbable  self-compla 
cency  rather  than  learning  or  mental  astuteness ; 
and  curiously  enough  it  wore  its  pleasantest  aspect 
on  the  countenances  of  the  older  men.  The  im 
press  of  zeal  and  moral  worth  seemed  to  dimin- 

8 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ish  by  regular  gradations  as  one  passed  to  younger 
faces  ;  and  among  the  very  beginners,  who  had  been 
ordained  only  within  the  past  day  or  two,  this  de 
cline  was  peculiarly  marked.  It  was  almost  a 
relief  to  note  the  relative  smallness  of  their  num 
ber,  so  plainly  was  it  to  be  seen  that  they  were  not 
the  men  their  forbears  had  been. 

And  if  those  aged,  worn-out  preachers  facing 
the  pulpit  had  gazed  instead  backward  over  the 
congregation,  it  may  be  that  here  too  their  old 
eyes  would  have  detected  a  difference,  —  what  at 
least  they  would  have  deemed  a  decline. 

But  nothing  was  further  from  the  minds  of  the 
members  of  the  First  M.  E.  church  of  Tecumseh 
than  the  suggestion  that  they  were  not  an  improve 
ment  on  those  who  had  gone  before  them.  They 
were  undoubtedly  the  smartest  and  most  important 
congregation  within  the  limits  of  the  Nedahma 
Conference,  and  this  new  church  edifice  of  theirs 
represented  alike  a  scale  of  outlay  and  a  standard 
of  progressive  taste  in  devotional  architecture 
unique  in  the  Methodism  of  that  whole  section  of 
the  State.  They  had  a  right  to  be  proud  of  them 
selves,  too.  They  belonged  to  the  substantial 
order  of  the  community,  with  perhaps  not  so 
many  very  rich  men  as  the  Presbyterians  had, 
but  on  the  other  hand  with  far  fewer  extremely 
poor  folk  than  the  Baptists  were  encumbered  with. 
The  pews  in  the  first  four  rows  of  their  church 
rented  for  one  hundred  dollars  apiece, — quite  up 

9 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

to  the  Presbyterian  highwater  mark,  —  and  they 
now  had  almost  abolished  free  pews  altogether. 
The  oyster  suppers  given  by  their  Ladies'  Aid 
Society  in  the  basement  of  the  church  during 
the  winter  had  established  rank  among  the  fash 
ionable  events  in  Tecumseh's  social  calendar. 

A  comprehensive  and  satisfied  perception  of 
these  advantages  was  uppermost  in  the  minds  of 
this  local  audience,  as  they  waited  for  the  Bishop 
to  begin  his  reading.  They  had  entertained  this 
Bishop  and  his  Presiding  Elders,  and  the  rank 
and  file  of  common  preachers,  in  a  style  which 
could  not  have  been  remotely  approached  by  any 
other  congregation  in  the  Conference.  Where 
else,  one  would  like  to  know,  could  the  Bishop 
have  been  domiciled  in  a  Methodist  house  where 
he  might  have  a  sitting-room  all  to  himself,  with 
his  bedroom  leading  out  of  it?  Every  clergy 
man  present  had  been  provided  for  in  a  private 
residence,  —  even  down  to  the  Licensed  Exhorters, 
who  were  not  really  ministers  at  all  when  you  came 
to  think  of  it,  and  who  might  well  thank  their  stars 
that  the  Conference  had  assembled  among  such 
open-handed  people.  There  existed  a  dim  feeling 
that  these  Licensed  Exhorters  —  an  uncouth  crew, 
with  country  store-keepers  and  lumbermen  and  even 
a  horse-doctor  among  their  number  —  had  taken 
rather  too  much  for  granted,  and  were  not  exhibit 
ing  quite  the  proper  degree  of  gratitude  over  their 
reception. 

10 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

But  a  more  important  issue  hung  now  imminent 
in  the  balance,  —  was  Tecumseh  to  be  fairly  and 
honorably  rewarded  for  her  hospitality  by  being 
given  the  pastor  of  her  choice? 

All  were  agreed  —  at  least  among  those  who 
paid  pew-rents  —  upon  the  great  importance  of 
a  change  in  the  pulpit  of  the  First  M.  E.  Church. 
A  change  in  persons  must  of  course  take  place,  for 
their  present  pastor  had  exhausted  the  three-year 
maximum  of  the  itinerant  system,  but  there  was 
needed  much  more  than  that.  For  a  handsome 
and  expensive  church  building  like  this,  and 
with  such  a  modern  and  go-ahead  congregation,  it 
was  simply  a  vital  necessity  to  secure  an  attrac 
tive  and  fashionable  preacher.  They  had  held 
their  own  against  the  Presbyterians  these  past 
few  years  only  by  the  most  strenuous  efforts,  and 
under  the  depressing  disadvantage  of  a  min 
ister  who  preached  dreary  out-of-date  sermons, 
and  who  lacked  even  the  most  rudimentary  sense 
of  social  distinctions.  The  Presbyterians  had 
captured  the  new  cashier  of  the  Adams  County 
Bank,  who  had  always  gone  to  the  Methodist 
Church  in  the  town  he  came  from,  but  now  was 
lost  solely  because  of  this  tiresome  old  fossil  of 
theirs ;  and  there  were  numerous  other  instances 
of  the  same  sort,  scarcely  less  grievous.  That 
this  state  of  things  must  be  altered  was  clear. 

The  unusually  large  local  attendance  upon  the 
sessions  of  the  Conference  had  given  some  of  the 

ii 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

more  guileless  of  visiting  brethren  a  high  notion  of 
Tecumseh's  piety ;  and  perhaps  even  the  most 
sophisticated  stranger  never  quite  realized  how 
strictly  it  was  to  be  explained  by  the  anxiety  to 
pick  out  a  suitable  champion  for  the  fierce  Presby 
terian  competition.  Big  gatherings  assembled 
evening  after  evening  to  hear  the  sermons  of  those 
selected  to  preach,  and  the  church  had  been 
almost  impossibly  crowded  at  each  of  the  three 
Sunday  services.  Opinions  had  naturally  differed 
a  good  deal  during  the  earlier  stages  of  this 
scrutiny,  but  after  last  night's  sermon  there  could 
be  but  one  feeling.  The  man  for  Tecumseh  was 
the  Reverend  Theron  Ware. 

The  choice  was  an  admirable  one,  from  points 
of  view  much  more  exalted  than  those  of  the  local 
congregation. 

You  could  see  Mr.  Ware  sitting  there  at  the  end 
of  the  row  inside  the  altar- rail,  —  the  tall,  slender 
young  man  with  the  broad  white  brow,  thoughtful 
eyes,  and  features  moulded  into  that  regularity  of 
strength  which  used  to  characterize  the  American 
Senatorial  type  in  those  far-away  days  of  clean 
shaven  faces  and  moderate  incomes  before  the 
War.  The  bright-faced,  comely,  and  vivacious 
young  woman  in  the  second  side  pew  was  his  wife 
—  and  Tecumseh  noted  with  approbation  that  she 
knew  how  to  dress.  There  were  really  no  two 
better  or  worthier  people  in  the  building  than  this 
young  couple,  who  sat  waiting  along  with  the  rest 

12 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

to  hear  their  fate.  But  unhappily  they  had  come 
to  know  of  the  effort  being  made  to  bring  them  to 
Tecumseh ;  and  their  simple  pride  in  the  triumph 
of  the  husband's  fine  sermon  had  become  swal 
lowed  up  in  a  terribly  anxious  conflict  of  hope  and 
fear.  Neither  of  them  could  maintain  a  satisfac 
tory  show  of  composure  as  the  decisive  moment 
approached.  The  vision  of  translation  from  pov 
erty  and  obscurity  to  such  a  splendid  post  as  this, 

—  truly  it  was  too  dazzling  for  tranquil  nerves. 
The  tedious  Bishop  had  at  last  begun  to  call  his 

roll  of  names,  and  the  good  people  of  Tecumseh 
mentally  ticked  them  oif,  one  by  one,  as  the  list 
expanded.  They  felt  that  it  was  like  this  Bishop 

—  an   unimportant   and   commonplace    figure    in 
Methodism,   not   to   be    mentioned   in   the  same 
breath  with  Simpson  and  Janes  and  Kingsley  — 
that  he  should  begin  with  the  backwoods  counties, 
and   thrust   all   these  remote  and  pitifully  rustic 
stations  ahead  of  their  own  metropolitan  charge. 
To  these  they  listened  but  listlessly,  —  indifferent 
alike  to  the  joy  and  to  the  dismay  which  he  was 
scattering  among  the  divines  before  him. 

The  announcements  were  being  doled  out  with 
stumbling  hesitation.  After  each  one  a  little  half- 
rustling  movement  through  the  crowded  rows  of 
clergymen  passed  mute  judgment  upon  the  cruel 
blow  this  brother  had  received,  the  reward  justly 
given  to  this  other,  the  favoritism  by  which  a  third 
had  profited.  The  Presiding  Elders,  whose  work 

13 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

all  this  was,  stared  with  gloomy  and  impersonal 
abstraction  down  upon  the  rows  of  blackcoated 
humanity  spread  before  them.  The  ministers 
returned  this  fixed  and  perfunctory  gaze  with  pale, 
set  faces,  only  feebly  masking  the  emotions  which 
each  new  name  stirred  somewhere  among  them. 
The  Bishop  droned  on  laboriously,  mispronoun 
cing  words  and  repeating  himself  as  if  he  were 
reading  a  catalogue  of  unfamiliar  seeds. 

"  First  church  of  Tecumseh  —  Brother  Abram 
G.  Tisdale  !  " 

There  was  no  doubt  about  it !  These  were 
actually  the  words  that  had  been  uttered.  After 
all  this  outlay,  all  this  lavish  hospitality,  all  this 
sacrifice  of  time  and  patience  in  sitting  through 
those  sermons,  to  draw  from  the  grab-bag  nothing 
better  than  —  a  Tisdale  ! 

A  hum  of  outraged  astonishment  —  half  groan, 
half  wrathful  snort  —  bounded  along  from  pew  to 
pew  throughout  the  body  of  the  church.  An  echo 
of  it  reached  the  Bishop,  and  so  confused  him  that 
he  haltingly  repeated  the  obnoxious  line.  Every 
local  eye  turned  as  by  intuition  to  where  the 
calamitous  Tisdale  sat,  and  fastened  malignantly 
upon  him. 

Could  anything  be  worse?  This  Brother  Tis 
dale  was  past  fifty,  —  a  spindling,  rickety,  gaunt  old 
man,  with  a  long  horse-like  head  and  vacantly 
solemn  face,  who  kept  one  or  the  other  of  his 
hands  continually  fumbling  his  bony  jaw.  He  had 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

been  withdrawn  from  routine  service  for  a  number 
of  years,  doing  a  little  insurance  canvassing  on  his 
own  account,  and  also  travelling  for  the  Book  Con 
cern.  Now  that  he  wished  to  return  to  parochial 
work,  the  richest  prize  in  the  whole  list,  Tecum- 
seh,  was  given  to  him,  —  to  him  who  had  never 
been  asked  to  preach  at  a  conference,  and  whose 
archaic  nasal  singing  of  "  Greenland's  Icy  Moun 
tains  "  had  made  even  the  Licensed  Exhorters 
grin  !  It  was  too  intolerably  dreadful  to  think  of ! 

An  embittered  whisper  to  the  effect  that  Tisdale 
was  the  Bishop's  cousin  ran  round  from  pew  to 
pew.  This  did  not  happen  to  be  true,  but  indig 
nant  Tecumseh  gave  it  entire  credit.  The  throngs 
about  the  doors  dwindled  as  by  magic,  and  the 
aisles  cleared.  Local  interest  was  dead ;  and 
even  some  of  the  pewholders  rose  and  made  their 
way  out.  One  of  these  murmured  audibly  to  his 
neighbors  as  he  departed  that  his  pew  could  be 
had  now  for  sixty  dollars. 

So  it  happened  that  when,  a  little  later  on,  the 
appointment  of  Theron  Ware  to  Octavius  was  read 
out,  none  of  the  people  of  Tecumseh  either  noted 
or  cared.  They  had  been  deeply  interested  in 
him  so  long  as  it  seemed  likely  that  he  was  to 
come  to  them,  —  before  their  clearly  expressed 
desire  for  him  had  been  so  monstrously  ignored. 
But  now  what  became  of  him  was  no  earthly  con 
cern  of  theirs. 

After  the  Doxology  had  been  sung  and  the  Con- 

15 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ference  formally  declared  ended,  the  Wares  would 
fain  have  escaped  from  the  flood  of  handshakings 
and  boisterous  farewells  which  spread  over  the 
front  part  of  the  church.  But  the  clergymen  were 
unusually  insistent  upon  demonstrations  of  cor 
diality  among  themselves,  —  the  more,  perhaps,  be 
cause  it  was  evident  that  the  friendliness  of  their 
local  hosts  had  suddenly  evaporated  ;  and,  of  all 
men  in  the  world,  the  priest  incumbent  of  the 
Octavius  pulpit  now  bore  down  upon  them  with 
noisy  effusiveness,  and  defied  evasion. 

"  Brother  Ware  —  we  have  never  been  inter- 
duced  —  but  let  me  clasp  your  hand  !  And  — 
Sister  Ware,  I  presume  —  yours  too  !  " 

He  was  a  portly  man,  who  held  his  head  back 
so  that  his  face  seemed  all  jowl  and  mouth  and 
sandy  chin-whisker.  He  smiled  broadly  upon 
them  with  half-closed  eyes,  and  shook  hands 
again. 

"  I  said  to  'em,"  he  went  on  with  loud  pretence 
of  heartiness,  "  the  minute  I  heerd  your  name 
called  out  for  our  dear  Octavius,  '  I  must  go  over 
an'  interduce  myself.'  It  will  be  a  heavy  cross  to 
part  with  those  dear  people,  Brother  Ware,  but  if 
anything  could  wean  me  to  the  notion,  so  to  speak, 
it  would  be  the  knowledge  that  you  are  to  take 
up  my  labors  in  their  midst.  Perhaps  —  ah  —  per 
haps  they  are  jest  a  trifle  close  in  money  matters, 
but  they  come  out  strong  on  revivals.  They  '11 
need  a  good  deal  o'  stirrin'  up  about  parsonage 

16 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

expenses,  but,  oh  !  such  seasons  of  grace  as  we  Ve 
experienced  there  together !  "  He  shook  his 
head,  and  closed  his  eyes  altogether,  as  if  trans 
ported  by  his  memories. 

Brother  Ware  smiled  faintly  in  decorous  re 
sponse,  and  bowed  in  silence  ;  but  his  wife  resented 
the  unctuous  beaming  of  content  on  the  other's 
wide  countenance,  and  could  not  restrain  her 
tongue. 

"  You  seem  to  bear  up  tolerably  well  under  this 
heavy  cross,  as  you  call  it,"  she  said  sharply. 

"  The  will  o'  the  Lord,  Sister  Ware,  —  the  will 
o'  the  Lord  !  "  he  responded,  disposed  for  the 
instant  to  put  on  his  pompous  manner  with  her, 
and  then  deciding  to  smile  again  as  he  moved 
off.  The  circumstance  that  he  was  to  get  an 
additional  three  hundred  dollars  yearly  in  his  new 
place  was  not  mentioned  between  them. 

By  a  mutual  impulse  the  young  couple,  when 
they  had  at  last  gained  the  cool  open  air,  crossed 
the  street  to  the  side  where  over-hanging  trees 
shaded  the  infrequent  lamps,  and  they  might  be 
comparatively  alone.  The  wife  had  taken  her 
husband's  arm,  and  pressed  closely  upon  it  as  they 
walked.  For  a  time  no  word  passed,  but  finally 
he  said,  in  a  grave  voice,  — 

"  It  is  hard  upon  you,  poor  girl." 

Then  she  stopped  short,  buried  her  face  against 
his  shoulder,  and  fell  to  sobbing. 

He  strove  with  gentle,  whispered  remonstrance 
2  17 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

to  win  her  from  this  mood,  and  after  a  few  mo 
ments  she  lifted  her  head  and  they  resumed  their 
walk,  she  wiping  her  eyes  as  they  went. 

"  I  could  n't  keep  it  in  a  minute  longer  !  "  she 
said,  catching  her  breath  between  phrases.  "  Oh, 
why  do  they  behave  so  badly  to  us,  Theron?  " 

He  smiled  down  momentarily  upon  her  as  they 
moved  along,  and  patted  her  hand. 

"  Somebody  must  have  the  poor  places,  Alice," 
he  said  consolingly.  "  I  am  a  young  man  yet, 
remember.  We  must  take  our  turn,  and  be 
patient.  For  '  we  know  that  all  things  work  to 
gether  for  good.'  " 

"  And  your  sermon  was  so  head-and-shoulders 
above  all  the  others  !  "  she  went  on  breathlessly. 
"  Everybody  said  so  !  And  Mrs.  Parshall  heard  it 
so  direct  that  you  were  to  be  sent  here,  and  I  know 
she  told  everybody  how  much  I  was  lotting  on  it 
—  I  wish  we  could  go  right  off  to-night  without 
going  to  her  house  —  I  shall  be  ashamed  to  look 
her  in  the  face  —  and  of  course  she  knows  we  're 
poked  off  to  that  miserable  Octavius.  —  Why, 
Theron,  they  tell  me  it 's  a  worse  place  even  than 
we  Ve  got  now  !  " 

"  Oh,  not  at  all,"  he  put  in  reassuringly.  "  It 
has  grown  to  be  a  large  town  —  oh,  quite  twice 
the  size  of  Tyre.  It 's  a  great  Irish  place,  I  've 
heard.  Our  own  church  seems  to  be  a  good  deal 
run  down  there.  We  must  build  it  up  again ;  and 
the  salary  is  better  —  a  little." 

18 


But  he  too  was  depressed,  and  they  walked  on 
toward  their  temporary  lodging  in  a  silence  full  of 
mutual  grief.  It  was  not  until  they  had  come 
within  sight  of  this  goal  that  he  prefaced  by  a  little 
sigh  of  resignation  these  further  words,  — 

"  Come,  let  us  make  the  best  of  it,  my  girl ! 
After  all,  we  are  in  the  hands  of  the  Lord." 

"  Oh,  don't,  Theron  !  "  she  said  hastily.  "  Don't 
talk  to  me  about  the  Lord  to-night;  I  can't 
bear  it!" 


CHAPTER    II 

"  THERON  !  Come  out  here  !  This  is  the  fun 
niest  thing  we  have  heard  yet !  " 

Mrs.  Ware  stood  on  the  platform  of  her  new 
kitchen  stoop.  The  bright  flood  of  May-morning 
sunshine  completely  enveloped  her  girlish  form, 
clad  in  a  simple,  fresh-starched  calico  gown,  and 
shone  in  golden  patches  upon  her  light-brown 
hair.  She  had  a  smile  on  her  face,  as  she  looked 
down  at  the  milk  boy  standing  on  the  bottom  step, 
—  a  smile  of  a  doubtful  sort,  stormily  mirthful. 

"  Come  out  a  minute,  Theron ! "  she  called 
again ;  and  in  obedience  to  the  summons  the  tall 
lank  figure  of  her  husband  appeared  in  the  open 
doorway  behind  her.  A  long  loose,  open  dress 
ing-gown  dangled  to  his  knees,  and  his  sallow, 
clean-shaven,  thoughtful  face  wore  a  morning 
undress  expression  of  youthful  good-nature.  He 
leaned  against  the  door-sill,  crossed  his  large  carpet 
slippers,  and  looked  up  into  the  sky,  drawing  a 
long  satisfied  breath. 

"  What  a  beautiful  morning  !  "  he  exclaimed. 
"  The  elms  over  there  are  full  of  robins.  We  must 
get  up  earlier  these  mornings,  and  walk." 

20 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

His  wife  indicated  the  boy  with  the  milk-pail  on 
his  arm,  by  a  wave  of  her  hand. 

"  Guess  what  he  tells  me  !  "  she  said.  "  It 
was  n't  a  mistake  at  all,  our  getting  no  milk  yester 
day  or  the  Sunday  before.  It  seems  that  that 's 
the  custom  here,  at  least  so  far  as  the  parsonage  is 
concerned." 

"What's  the  matter,  boy?"  asked  the  young 
minister,  drawling  his  words  a  little,  and  putting  a 
sense  of  placid  irony  into  them.  "  Don't  the  cows 
give  milk  on  Sunday,  then?  " 

The  boy  was  not  going  to  be  chaffed.  "  Oh, 
I  '11  bring  you  milk  fast  enough  on  Sundays,  if  you 
give  me  the  word,"  he  said  with  nonchalance. 
"  Only  it  won't  last  long." 

"  How  do  you  mean,  —  '  won't  last  long  '  ?  " 
asked  Mrs.  Ware,  briskly. 

The  boy  liked  her,  —  both  for  herself,  and  for 
the  doughnuts  fried  with  her  own  hands,  which  she 
gave  him  on  his  morning  round.  He  dropped  his 
half-defiant  tone. 

"  The  thing  of  it 's  this,"  he  explained.  "  Every 
new  minister  starts  in  saying  we  can  deliver  to  this 
house  on  Sundays,  an'  then  gives  us  notice  to  stop 
before  the  month 's  out.  It 's  the  trustees  that 
does  it." 

The  Rev.  Theron  Ware  uncrossed  his  feet  and 
moved  out  on  to  the  stoop  beside  his  wife. 
"  What 's  that  you  say?  "  he  interjected.  "  Don't 
they  take  milk  on  Sundays?  " 

21 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  Nope  !  "  answered  the  boy. 

The  young  couple  looked  each  other  in  the  face 
for  a  puzzled  moment,  then  broke  into  a  laugh. 

"Well,  we'll  try  it,  anyway,"  said  the  preacher. 
"  You  can  go  on  bringing  it  Sundays  till  —  till  —  " 

"  Till  you  cave  in  an'  tell  me  to  stop,"  put  in 
the  boy.  "  All  right  ! "  and  he  was  off  on  the 
instant,  the  dipper  jangling  loud  incredulity  in  his 
pail  as  he  went. 

The  Wares  exchanged  another  glance  as  he 
disappeared  round  the  corner  of  the  house,  and 
another  mutual  laugh  seemed  imminent.  Then 
the  wife's  face  clouded  over,  and  she  thrust  her 
under-lip  a  trifle  forward  out  of  its  place  in  the 
straight  and  gently  firm  profile. 

"  It 's  just  what  Wendell  Phillips  said,"  she 
declared.  "  '  The  Puritan's  idea  of  hell  is  a  place 
where  everybody  has  to  mind  his  own  business.' ' 

The  young  minister  stroked  his  chin  thought 
fully,  and  let  his  gaze  wander  over  the  backyard  in 
silence.  The  garden  parts  had  not  been  spaded 
up,  but  lay,  a  useless  stretch  of  muddy  earth, 
broken  only  by  last  year's  cabbage-stumps  and 
the  general  litter  of  dead  roots  and  vegetation. 
The  door  of  the  tenantless  chicken-coop  hung 
wide  open.  Before  it  was  a  great  heap  of  ashes 
and  cinders,  soaked  into  grimy  hardness  by  the 
recent  spring  rains,  and  nearer  still  an  ancient 
chopping-block,  round  which  were  scattered  old 
weather-beaten  hardwood  knots  which  had  defied 

22 


the  axe,  parts  of  broken  barrels  and  packing-boxes, 
and  a  nameless  debris  of  tin  cans,  clam-shells,  and 
general  rubbish.  It  was  pleasanter  to  lift  the  eyes, 
and  look  across  the  neighbors'  fences  to  the  green, 
waving  tops  of  the  elms  on  the  street  beyond. 
How  lofty  and  beautiful  they  were  in  the  morning 
sunlight,  and  with  what  matchless  charm  came  the 
song  of  the  robins,  freshly  installed  in  their  haunts 
among  the  new  pale-green  leaves  !  Above  them, 
in  the  fresh,  scented  air,  glowed  the  great  blue 
dome,  radiant  with  light  and  the  purification  of 
spring. 

Theron  lifted  his  thin,  long- fingered  hand,  and 
passed  it  in  a  slow  arch  of  movement  to  compre 
hend  this  glorious  upper  picture. 

"  What  matter  any  one's  ideas  of  hell,"  he  said, 
in  soft,  grave  tones,  "  when  we  have  that  to  look 
at,  and  listen  to,  and  fill  our  lungs  with  ?  It  seems 
to  me  that  we  never  feel  quite  so  sure  of  God's 
goodness  at  other  times  as  we  do  in  these  wonder 
ful  new  mornings  of  spring." 

The  wife  followed  his  gesture,  and  her  eyes 
rested  for  a  brief  moment,  with  pleased  interest, 
upon  the  trees  and  the  sky.  Then  they  reverted, 
with  a  harsher  scrutiny,  to  the  immediate  fore 
ground. 

"Those  Van  Sizers  ought  to  be  downright 
ashamed  of  themselves,"  she  said,  "  to  leave  every 
thing  in  such  a  muss  as  this.  You  must  see  about 
getting  a  man  to  clean  up  the  yard,  Theron.  It 's 

23 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

no  use  your  thinking  of  doing  it  yourself.  In  the 
first  place,  it  would  n't  look  quite  the  thing,  and, 
second,  you  'd  never  get  at  it  in  all  your  born  days. 
Or  if  a  man  would  cost  too  much,  we  might  get  a 
boy.  I  daresay  Harvey  would  come  around,  after 
he  'd  finished  with  his  milk-route  in  the  forenoon 
We  could  give  him  his  dinner,  you  know,  and  I  'd 
bake  him  some  cookies.  He  's  got  the  greatest 
sweet-tooth  you  ever  heard  of.  And  then  perhaps 
if  we  gave  him  a  quarter,  or  say  half  a  dollar,  he  'd 
be  quite  satisfied.  I  '11  speak  to  him  in  the  morn 
ing.  We  can  save  a  dollar  or  so  that  way." 

"  I  suppose  every  little  does  help,"  commented 
Mr.  Ware,  with  a  doleful  lack  of  conviction.  Then 
his  face  brightened.  "  I  tell  you  what  let 's  do  !  " 
he  exclaimed.  "  Get  on  your  street  dress,  and 
we  '11  take  a  long  walk,  way  out  into  the  country. 
You  Ve  never  seen  the  basin,  where  they  float  the 
log-rafts  in,  or  the  big  saw-mills.  The  hills  beyond 
give  you  almost  mountain  effects,  they  are  so  steep  ; 
and  they  say  there 's  a  sulphur  spring  among  the 
slate  on  the  hill-side,  somewhere,  with  trees  all 
about  it ;  and  we  could  take  some  sandwiches  with 
us—" 

"You  forget,"  put  in  Mrs.  Ware,  —  "those 
trustees  are  coming  at  eleven." 

"  So  they  are  !  "  assented  the  young  minister, 
with  something  like  a  sigh.  He  cast  another  re 
luctant,  lingering  glance  at  the  sunlit  elm  boughs, 
and,  turning,  went  indoors. 

24 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

He  loitered  for  an  aimless  minute  in  the  kitchen, 
where  his  wife,  her  sleeves  rolled  to  the  elbow,  now 
resumed  the  interrupted  washing  of  the  breakfast 
dishes,  —  perhaps  with  vague  visions  of  that  ever- 
receding  time  to  come  when  they  might  have  a 
hired  girl  to  do  such  work.  Then  he  wandered  off 
into  the  room  beyond,  which  served  them  alike  as 
living-room  and  study,  and  let  his  eye  run  along 
the  two  rows  of  books  that  constituted  his  library. 
He  saw  nothing  which  he  wanted  to  read.  Finally 
he  did  take  down  "  Paley's  Evidences,"  and 
seated  himself  in  the  big  armchair,  —  that  costly 
and  oversized  anomaly  among  his  humble  house 
hold  gods ;  but  the  book  lay  unopened  on  his 
knee,  and  his  eyelids  half  closed  themselves  in 
sign  of  revery. 

This  was  his  third  charge,  —  this  Octavius  which 
they  both  knew  they  were  going  to  dislike  so 
much. 

The  first  had  been  in  the  pleasant  dairy  and 
hop  country  many  miles  to  the  south,  on  another 
watershed  and  among  a  different  kind  of  people. 
Perhaps,  in  truth,  the  grinding  labor,  the  poverty 
of  ideas,  the  systematic  selfishness  of  later  rural 
experience,  had  not  been  lacking  there ;  but  they 
played  no  part  in  the  memories  which  now  he 
passed  in  tender  review.  He  recalled  instead  the 
warm  sunshine  on  the  fertile  expanse  of  fields ;  the 
sleek,  well-fed  herds  of  "  milkers  "  coming  lowing 
down  the  road  under  the  maples ;  the  prosperous 

25 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  hospitable  farmhouses,  with  their  orchards  in 
blossom  and  their  spacious  red  barns ;  the  bounti 
ful  boiled  dinners  which  cheery  housewives  served 
up  with  their  own  skilled  hands.  Of  course,  he 
admitted  to  himself,  it  would  not  be  the  same  if 
he  were  to  go  back  there  again.  He  was  conscious 
of  having  moved  along  —  was  it,  after  all,  an  ad 
vance  ?  —  to  a  point  where  it  was  unpleasant  to 
sit  at  table  with  the  un fragrant  hired  man,  and 
still  worse  to  encounter  the  bucolic  confusion 
between  the  functions  of  knives  and  forks.  But  in 
those  happy  days  —  young,  zealous,  himself  farm- 
bred  —  these  trifles  had  been  invisible  to  him,  and 
life  there  among  those  kindly  husbandmen  had 
seemed,  by  contrast  with  the  gaunt  surroundings 
and  gloomy  rule  of  the  theological  seminary, 
luxuriously  abundant  and  free. 

It  was  there  too  that  the  crowning  blessedness  of 
his  youth  —  nay,  should  he  not  say  of  all  his  days  ? 
—  had  come  to  him.  There  he  had  first  seen 
Alice  Hastings,  —  the  bright-eyed,  frank-faced, 
serenely  self-reliant  girl,  who  now,  less  than  four 
years  thereafter,  could  be  heard  washing  the  dishes 
out  in  the  parsonage  kitchen. 

How  wonderful  she  had  seemed  to  him  then  ! 
How  beautiful  and  all-beneficent  the  miracle  still 
appeared !  Though  herself  the  daughter  of  a 
farmer,  her  presence  on  a  visit  within  the  borders 
of  his  remote  country  charge  had  seemed  to  make 
everything  there  a  hundred  times  more  countrified 

26 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

than  it  had  ever  been  before.  She  was  fresh  from 
the  refinements  of  a  town  seminary :  she  read 
books ;  it  was  known  that  she  could  play  upon  the 
piano.  Her  clothes,  her  manners,  her  way  of 
speaking,  the  readiness  of  her  thoughts  and 
sprightly  tongue,  — not  least,  perhaps,  the  imposing 
current  understanding  as  to  her  father's  wealth,  — 
placed  her  on  a  glorified  pinnacle  far  away  from 
the  girls  of  the  neighborhood.  These  honest  and 
good-hearted  creatures  indeed  called  ceaseless 
attention  to  her  superiority  by  their  deference  and 
open-mouthed  admiration,  and  treated  it  as  the 
most  natural  thing  in  the  world  that  their  young 
minister  should  be  visibly  "  taken  "  with  her. 

Theron  Ware,  in  truth,  left  this  first  pastorate  of 
his  the  following  spring,  in  a  transfiguring  halo  of 
romance.  His  new  appointment  was  to  Tyre,  — 
a  somewhat  distant  village  of  traditional  local  pride 
and  substance,  —  and  he  was  to  be  married  only  a 
day  or  so  before  entering  upon  his  pastoral  duties 
there.  The  good  people  among  whom  he  had 
begun  his  ministry  took  kindly  credit  to  themselves 
that  he  had  met  his  bride  while  she  was  "  visiting 
round  "  their  countryside.  In  part  by  jocose  in 
quiries  addressed  to  the  expectant  groom ;  in  part 
by  the  confidences  of  the  postmaster  at  the  corners 
concerning  the  bulk  and  frequency  of  the  corre 
spondence  passing  between  Theron  and  the  now 
remote  Alice,  —  they  had  followed  the  progress  of 
the  courtship  through  the  autumn  and  winter  with 

27 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

friendly  zest.  When  he  returned  from  the  con 
ference,  to  say  good-bye  and  confess  the  happiness 
that  awaited  him,  they  gave  him  a  "  donation,"  — 
quite  as  if  he  were  a  married  pastor  with  a  home 
of  his  own,  instead  of  a  shy  young  bachelor,  who 
received  his  guests  and  their  contributions  in  the 
house  where  he  boarded. 

He  went  away  with  tears  of  mingled  regret  and 
proud  joy  in  his  eyes,  thinking  a  good  deal  upon 
their  predictions  of  a  distinguished  career  before 
him,  feeling  infinitely  strengthened  and  upborne 
by  the  hearty  fervor  of  their  God- speed,  and  taking 
with  him  nearly  two  wagon-loads  of  vegetables, 
apples,  canned  preserves,  assorted  furniture,  glass 
dishes,  cheeses,  pieced  bedquilts,  honey,  feathers, 
and  kitchen  utensils. 

Of  the  three  years'  term  in  Tyre,  it  was  pleas- 
antest  to  dwell  upon  the  beginning.' 

The  young  couple  —  after  being  married  out  at 
Alice's  home  in  an  adjoining  county,  under  the 
depressing  conditions  of  a  hopelessly  bedridden 
mother,  and  a  father  and  brothers  whose  percep 
tions  were  obviously  closed  to  the  advantages  of  a 
matrimonial  connection  with  Methodism  —  came 
straight  to  the  house  which  their  new  congregation 
rented  as  a  parsonage.  The  impulse  of  reaction 
from  the  rather  grim  cheerlessness  of  their  wedding 
lent  fresh  gayety  to  their  lighthearted,  whimsical 
start  at  housekeeping.  They  had  never  laughed 
so  much  in  all  their  lives  as  they  did  now  in  these 

28 


THE   DAMNATION   OF  THERON   WARE 

first  months,  —  over  their  weird  ignorance  of 
domestic  details ;  with  its  mishaps,  mistakes,  and 
entertaining  discoveries ;  over  the  comical  supera 
bundances  and  shortcomings  of  their  "donation" 
outfit;  over  the  thousand  and  one  quaint  experi 
ences  of  their  novel  relation  to  each  other,  to  the 
congregation,  and  to  the  world  of  Tyre  at  large. 

Theron,  indeed,  might  be  said  never  to  have 
laughed  before.  Up  to  that  time  no  friendly 
student  of  his  character,  cataloguing  his  admirable 
qualities,  would  have  thought  of  including  among 
them  a  sense  of  humor,  much  less  a  bent  toward 
levity.  Neither  his  early  strenuous  battle  to  get 
away  from  the  farm  and  achieve  such  education  as 
should  serve  to  open  to  him  the  gates  of  profes 
sional  life,  nor  the  later  wave  of  religious  enthusiasm 
which  caught  him  up  as  he  stood  on  the  border-land 
of  manhood,  and  swept  him  off  into  a  veritable 
new  world  of  views  and  aspirations,  had  been  a 
likely  school  of  merriment.  People  had  prized 
him  for  his  innocent  candor  and  guileless  mind, 
for  his  good  heart,  his  pious  zeal,  his  modesty  about 
gifts  notably  above  the  average,  but  it  had  occurred 
to  none  to  suspect  in  him  a  latent  funny  side. 

But  who  could  be  solemn  where  Alice  was?  — 
Alice  in  a  quandary  over  the  complications  of  her 
cooking  stove ;  Alice  boiling  her  potatoes  all  day, 
and  her  eggs  for  half  an  hour ;  Alice  ordering  twenty 
pounds  of  steak  and  half  a  pound  of  sugar,  and 
striving  to  extract  a  breakfast  beverage  from  the 

29 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  TKERON  WARE 

unground  coffee-bean?  Clearly  not  so  tenderly 
fond  and  sympathetic  a  husband  as  Theron.  He 
began  by  laughing  because  she  laughed,  and  grew 
by  swift  stages  to  comprehend,  then  frankly  to 
share,  her  amusement.  From  this  it  seemed  only 
a  step  to  the  development  of  a  humor  of  his  own, 
doubling,  as  it  were,  their  sportive  resources.  He 
found  himself  discovering  a  new  droll  aspect  in 
men  and  things ;  his  phraseology  took  on  a  dryly 
playful  form,  fittingly  to  present  conceits  which 
danced  up,  unabashed,  quite  into  the  presence 
of  lofty  and  majestic  truths.  He  got  from  this 
nothing  but  satisfaction ;  it  obviously  involved  in 
creased  claims  to  popularity  among  his  parishioners, 
and  consequently  magnified  powers  of  usefulness, 
and  it  made  life  so  much  more  a  joy  and  a  thing 
to  be  thankful  for.  Often,  in  the  midst  of  the 
exchange  of  merry  quip  and  whimsical  suggestion, 
bright  blossoms  on  that  tree  of  strength  and  knowl 
edge  which  he  felt  expanding  now  with  a  mighty 
outward  pushing  in  all  directions,  he  would  lapse 
into  deep  gravity,  and  ponder  with  a  swelling 
heart  the  vast  unspeakable  marvel  of  his  blessed 
ness,  in  being  thus  enriched  and  humanized  by 
daily  communion  with  the  most  worshipful  of 
womankind. 

This  happy  and  good  young  couple  took  the 
affections  of  Tyre  by  storm.  The  Methodist  Church 
there  had  at  no  time  held  its  head  very  high  among 
the  denominations,  and  for  some  years  back  had 

3° 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

been  in  a  deplorably  sinking  state,  owing  first  to 
the  secession  of  the  Free  Methodists  and  then  to 
the  incumbency  of  a  pastor  who  scandalized  the 
community  by  marrying  a  black  man  to  a  white 
woman.  But  the  Wares  changed  all  this.  Within 
a  month  the  report  of  Theron's  charm  and  force 
in  the  pulpit  was  crowding  the  church  building  to 
its  utmost  capacity,  —  and  that,  too,  with  some  ot 
Tyre's  best  people.  Equally  winning  was  the 
atmosphere  of  jollity  and  juvenile  high  spirits 
which  pervaded  the  parsonage  under  these  new 
conditions,  and  which  Theron  and  Alice  seemed 
to  diffuse  wherever  they  went. 

Thus  swimmingly  their  first  year  sped,  amid 
universal  acclaim.  Mrs.  Ware  had  a  recognized 
social  place,  quite  outside  the  restricted  limits  of 
Methodism,  and  shone  in  it  with  an  unflagging 
brilliancy  altogether  beyond  the  traditions  of  Tyre. 
Delightful  as  she  was  in  other  people's  houses,  she 
was  still  more  naively  fascinating  in  her  own 
quaint  and  somewhat  harum-scarum  domicile  ;  and 
the  drab,  two-storied,  tin-roofed  little  parsonage 
might  well  have  rattled  its  clapboards  to  see  if  it 
was  not  in  dreamland,  —  so  gay  was  the  company, 
so  light  were  the  hearts,  which  it  sheltered  in  these 
new  days.  As  for  Theron,  the  period  was  one  of 
incredible  fructification  and  output.  He  scarcely 
recognized  for  his  own  the  mind  which  now  was 
reaching  out  on  all  sides  with  the  arms  of  an 
octopus,  exploring  unsuspected  mines  of  thought, 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

bringing  in  rich  treasures  of  deduction,  assimilat 
ing,  building,  propounding  as  if  by  some  force 
quite  independent  of  him.  He  could  not  look 
without  blinking  timidity  at  the  radiance  of  the 
path  stretched  out  before  him,  leading  upward 
to  dazzling  heights  of  greatness. 

At  the  end  of  this  first  year  the  Wares  suddenly 
discovered  that  they  were  eight  hundred  dollars  in 
debt. 

The  second  year  was  spent  in  arriving,  by  slow 
stages  and  with  a  cruel  wealth  of  pathetic  detail, 
at  a  realization  of  what  being  eight  hundred  dollars 
in  debt  meant. 

It  was  not  in  their  elastic  and  buoyant  natures 
to  grasp  the  full  significance  of  the  thing  at  once, 
or  easily.  Their  position  in  the  social  structure, 
too,  was  all  against  clear-sightedness  in  material 
matters.  A  general,  for  example,  uniformed  and 
in  the  saddle,  advancing  through  the  streets  with 
his  staff  in  the  proud  wake  of  his  division's  massed 
walls  of  bayonets,  cannot  be  imagined  as  quailing 
at  the  glance  thrown  at  him  by  his  tailor  on  the 
sidewalk.  Similarly,  a  man  invested  with  sacer 
dotal  authority,  who  baptizes,  marries,  and  buries, 
who  delivers  judgments  from  the  pulpit  which  may 
not  be  questioned  in  his  hearing,  and  who  receives 
from  all  his  fellow-men  a  special  deference  of 
manner  and  speech,  is  in  the  nature  of  things 
prone  to  see  the  grocer's  book  and  the  butcher's 
bill  through  the  little  end  of  the  telescope. 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

The  Wares  at  the  outset  had  thought  it  right  to 
trade  as  exclusively  as  possible  with  members  of 
their  own  church  society.  This  loyalty  became  a 
principal  element  of  martyrdom.  Theron  had  his 
creditors  seated  in  serried  rows  before  him,  Sunday 
after  Sunday.  Alice  had  her  critics  consolidated 
among  those  whom  it  was  her  chief  duty  to  visit 
and  profess  friendship  for.  These  situations  now 
began,  by  regular  gradations,  to  unfold  their  ter 
rors.  At  the  first  intimation  of  discontent,  the 
Wares  made  what  seemed  to  them  a  sweeping 
reduction  in  expenditure.  When  they  heard  that 
Brother  Potter  had  spoken  of  them  as  "  poor  pay," 
they  dismissed  their  hired  girl.  A  little  later, 
Theron  brought  himself  to  drop  a  laboriously 
casual  suggestion  as  to  a  possible  increase  of 
salary,  and  saw  with  sinking  spirits  the  faces  of 
the  stewards  freeze  with  dumb  disapprobation. 
Then  Alice  paid  a  visit  to  her  parents,  only  to  find 
her  brothers  doggedly  hostile  to  the  notion  of  her 
being  helped,  and  her  father  so  much  under  their 
influence  that  the  paltry  sum  he  dared  offer  barely 
covered  the  expenses  of  her  journey.  With  an 
other  turn  of  the  screw,  they  sold  the  piano  she 
had  brought  with  her  from  home,  and  cut  them 
selves  down  to  the  bare  necessities  of  life,  neither 
receiving  company  nor  going  out.  They  never 
laughed  now,  and  even  smiles  grew  rare. 

By  this  time  Theron's  sermons,  preached  under 
that  stony  glare  of  people  to  whom  he  owed 
3  33 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

money,  had  degenerated  to  a  pitiful  level  of  com 
monplace.  As  a  consequence,  the  attendance 
became  once  more  confined  to  the  insufficient 
membership  of  the  church,  and  the  trustees  com 
plained  of  grievously  diminished  receipts.  When 
the  Wares,  grown  desperate,  ventured  upon  the 
experiment  of  trading  outside  the  bounds  of  the 
congregation,  the  trustees  complained  again,  this 
time  peremptorily. 

Thus  the  second  year  dragged  itself  miserably 
to  an  end.  Nor  was  relief  possible,  because  the 
Presiding  Elder  knew  something  of  the  circum 
stances,  and  felt  it  his  duty  to  send  Theron  back 
for  a  third  year,  to  pay  his  debts,  and  drain  the 
cup  of  disciplinary  medicine  to  its  dregs. 

The  worst  has  been  told.  Beginning  in  utter 
blackness,  this  third  year,  in  the  second  month, 
brought  a  change  as  welcome  as  it  was  unlocked 
for.  An  elderly  and  important  citizen  of  Tyre,  by 
name  Abram  Beekman,  whom  Theron  knew  slightly, 
and  had  on  occasions  seen  sitting  in  one  of  the  back 
pews  near  the  door,  called  one  morning  at  the  par 
sonage,  and  electrified  its  inhabitants  by  expressing 
a  desire  to  wipe  off  all  their  old  scores  for  them, 
and  give  them  a  fresh  start  in  life.  As  he  put  the 
suggestion,  they  could  find  no  excuse  for  rejecting 
it.  He  had  watched  them,  and  heard  a  good  deal 
about  them,  and  took  a  fatherly  sort  of  interest  in 
them.  He  did  not  deprecate  their  regarding  the 
aid  he  proffered  them  in  the  nature  of  a  loan,  but 

34 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

they  were  to  make  themselves  perfectly  easy  about 
it,  and  never  return  it  at  all  unless  they  could  spare 
it  sometime  with  entire  convenience,  and  felt  that 
they  wanted  to  do  so.  As  this  amazing  windfall 
finally  took  shape,  it  enabled  the  Wares  to  live 
respectably  through  the  year,  and  to  leave  Tyre 
with  something  over  one  hundred  dollars  in  hand. 

It  enabled  them,  too,  to  revive  in  a  chastened 
form  their  old  dream  of  ultimate  success  and  dis 
tinction  for  Theron.  He  had  demonstrated  clearly 
enough  to  himself,  during  that  brief  season  of  un 
restrained  effulgence,  that  he  had  within  him  the 
making  of  a  great  pulpit  orator.  He  set  to  work 
now,  with  resolute  purpose,  to  puzzle  out  and 
master  all  the  principles  which  underlie  this  art, 
and  all  the  tricks  that  adorn  its  superstructure. 
He  studied  it,  fastened  his  thoughts  upon  it,  talked 
daily  with  Alice  about  it.  In  the  pulpit,  addressing 
those  people  who  had  so  darkened  his  life  and 
crushed  the  first  happiness  out  of  his  home,  he 
withheld  himself  from  any  oratorical  display  which 
could  afford  them  gratification.  He  put  aside,  as 
well,  the  thought  of  attracting  once  more  the  non- 
Methodists  of  Tyre,  whose  early  enthusiasm  had 
spread  such  pitfalls  for  his  unwary  feet.  He 
practised  effects  now  by  piecemeal,  with  an  alert 
ear,  and  calculation  in  every  tone.  An  ambition, 
at  once  embittered  and  tearfully  solicitous,  pos 
sessed  him. 

He  reflected  now,  this  morning,  with  a  certain 

35 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

incredulous  interest,  upon  that  unworthy  epoch  in 
his  life  history,  which  seemed  so  far  behind  him, 
and  yet  had  come  to  a  close  only  a  few  weeks  ago. 
The  opportunity  had  been  given  him,  there  at  the 
Tecumseh  Conference,  to  reveal  his  quality.  He 
had  risen  to  its  full  limit  of  possibilities,  and 
preached  a  great  sermon  in  a  manner  which  he  at 
least  knew  was  unapproachable.  He  had  made 
his  most  powerful  bid  for  the  prize  place,  had 
trebly  deserved  success  —  and  had  been  banished 
instead  to  Octavius  ! 

The  curious  thing  was  that  he  did  not  resent  his 
failure.  Alice  had  taken  it  hard,  but  he  himself 
was  conscious  of  a  sense  of  spiritual  gain.  The 
influence  of  the  Conference,  with  its  songs  and 
seasons  of  prayer  and  high  pressure  of  emotional 
excitement,  was  still  strong  upon  him.  It  seemed 
years  and  years  since  the  religious  side  of  him  had 
been  so  stirred  into  motion.  He  felt,  as  he  lay 
back  in  the  chair,  and  folded  his  hands  over  the 
book  on  his  knee,  that  he  had  indeed  come  forth 
from  the  fire  purified  and  strengthened.  The 
ministry  to  souls  diseased  beckoned  him  with  a 
new  and  urgent  significance.  He  smiled  to  re 
member  that  Mr.  Beekman,  speaking  in  his  shrewd 
and  pointed  way,  had  asked  him  whether,  looking 
it  all  over,  he  did  n't  think  it  would  be  better  for 
him  to  study  law,  with  a  view  to  sliding  out  of  the 
ministry  when  a  good  chance  offered.  It  amazed 
him  now  to  recall  that  he  had  taken  this  hint  seri- 

36 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ously,  and  even  gone  to  the  length  of  finding  out 
what  books  law-students  began  upon. 

Thank  God  !  all  that  was  past  and  gone  now. 
The  Call  sounded,  resonant  and  imperative,  in  his 
ears,  and  there  was  no  impulse  of  his  heart,  no 
fibre  of  his  being,  which  did  not  stir  in  devout 
response.  He  closed  his  eyes,  to  be  the  more 
wholly  alone  with  the  Spirit,  that  moved  him. 

The  jangling  of  a  bell  in  the  hallway  broke 
sharply  upon  his  meditations,  and  on  the  instant 
his  wife  thrust  in  her  head  from  the  kitchen. 

"You'll  have  to  go  to  the  door,  Theron  !  "  she 
warned  him,  in  a  loud,  swift  whisper.  "  I  'm  not 
fit  to  be  seen.  It 's  the  trustees." 

"All  right,"  he  said,  and  rose  slowly  from 
sprawling  recumbency  to  his  feet.  "  I  '11  go." 

"And  don't  forget,"  she  added  strenuously;  "  I 
believe  in  Levi  Gorringe  !  I  've  seen  him  go  past 
here  with  his  rod  and  fish-basket  twice  in  eight 
days,  and  that 's  a  good  sign.  He  's  got  a  soft  side 
somewhere.  And  just  keep  a  stiff  upper  lip  about 
the  gas,  and  don't  you  let  them  jew  you  down  a 
solitary  cent  on  that  sidewalk." 

"All  right,"  said  Theron,  again,  and  moved 
reluctantly  toward  the  hall- door. 


37 


CHAPTER  III 

WHEN  the  three  trustees  had  been  shown  in  by 
the  Rev.  Mr.  Ware,  and  had  taken  seats,  an  awk 
ward  little  pause  ensued.  The  young  minister 
looked  doubtingly  from  one  face  to  another,  the 
while  they  glanced  with  inquiring  interest  about 
the  room,  noting  the  pictures  and  appraising  the 
furniture  in  their  minds. 

The  obvious  leader  of  the  party,  Loren  Pierce, 
a  rich  quarryman,  was  an  old  man  of  medium  size 
and  mean  attire,  with  a  square,  beardless  face  as 
hard  and  impassive  in  expression  as  one  of  his 
blocks  of  limestone.  The  irregular,  thin-lipped 
mouth,  slightly  sunken,  and  shut  with  vice-like 
firmness,  the  short  snub  nose,  and  the  little  eyes 
squinting  from  half-closed  lids  beneath  slightly 
marked  brows,  seemed  scarcely  to  attain  to  the 
dignity  of  features,  but  evaded  attention  instead, 
as  if  feeling  that  they  were  only  there  at  all  from 
plain  necessity,  and  ought  not  to  be  taken  into 
account.  Mr.  Pierce's  face  did  not  know  how  to 
smile,  —  what  was  the  use  of  smiles?  —  but  its 
whole  surface  radiated  secretiveness.  Portrayed 
on  canvas  by  a  master  brush,  with  a  ruif  or  a  red 

38 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

robe  for  masquerade,  generations  of  imaginative 
amateurs  would  have  seen  in  it  vast-reaching 
plots,  the  skeletons  of  a  dozen  dynastic  cupboards, 
the  guarded  mysteries  of  half  a  century's  inter 
national  diplomacy.  The  amateurs  would  have 
been  wrong  again.  There  was  nothing  behind 
Mr.  Pierce 's  juiceless  countenance  more  weighty 
than  a  general  determination  to  exact  seven  per 
cent  for  his  money,  and  some  specific  notions 
about  capturing  certain  brickyards  which  were 
interfering  with  his  quarry-sales.  But  Octavius 
watched  him  shamble  along  its  sidewalks  quite 
as  the  Vienna  of  dead  and  forgotten  yesterday 
might  have  watched  Metternich. 

Erastus  Winch  was  of  a  breezier  sort,  —  a  florid, 
stout,  and  sandy  man,  who  spent  most  of  his  life 
driving  over  evil  country  roads  in  a  buggy,  secur 
ing  orders  for  dairy  furniture  and  certain  allied 
lines  of  farm  utensils.  This  practice  had  given 
him  a  loud  voice  and  a  deceptively  hearty  manner, 
to  which  the  other  avocation  of  cheese-buyer, 
which  he  pursued  at  the  Board  of  Trade  meetings 
every  Monday  afternoon,  had  added  a  consider 
able  command  of  persuasive  yet  non-committal 
language.  To  look  at  him,  still  more  to  hear  him, 
one  would  have  sworn  he  was  a  good  fellow,  a 
trifle  rough  and  noisy,  perhaps,  but  all  right  at 
bottom.  But  the  County  Clerk  of  Dearborn 
County  could  have  told  you  of  agriculturists  who 
knew  Erastus  from  long  and  unhappy  experience, 

39 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  who  held  him  to  be  even  a  tighter  man  than 
Loren  Pierce  in  the  matter  of  a  mortgage. 

The  third  trustee,  Levi  Gorringe,  set  one  won 
dering  at  the  very  first  glance  what  on  earth  he 
was  doing  in  that  company.  Those  who  had 
known  him  longest  had  the  least  notion;  but  it 
may  be  added  that  no  one  knew  him  well.  He 
was  a  lawyer,  and  had  lived  in  Octavius  for  up 
wards  of  ten  years ;  that  is  to  say,  since  early  man 
hood.  He  had  an  office  on  the  main  street,  just 
under  the  principal  photograph  gallery.  Doubt 
less  he  was  sometimes  in  this  office ;  but  his 
fellow-townsmen  saw  him  more  often  in  the  street 
doorway,  with  the  stairs  behind  him,  and  the  flar 
ing  show-cases  of  the  photographer  on  either  side, 
standing  with  his  hands  in  his  pockets  and  an 
unlighted  cigar  in  his  mouth,  looking  at  nothing 
in  particular.  About  every  other  day  he  went  off 
after  breakfast  into  the  country  roundabout,  some 
times  with  a  rod,  sometimes  with  a  gun,  but  always 
alone.  He  was  a  bachelor,  and  slept  in  a  room 
at  the  back  of  his  office,  cooking  some  of  his 
meals  himself,  getting  others  at  a  restaurant  close 
by.  Though  he  had  little  visible  practice,  he  was 
understood  to  be  well-to-do  and  even  more,  and 
people  tacitly  inferred  that  he  "shaved  notes." 
The  Methodists  of  Octavius  looked  upon  him  as 
a  queer  fish,  and  through  nearly  a  dozen  years 
had  never  quite  outgrown  their  hebdomadal  ten 
dency  to  surprise  at  seeing  him  enter  their  church. 

40 


THE   DAMNATION   OF  THERON   WARE 

He  had  never,  it  is  true,  professed  religion,  but 
they  had  elected  him  as  a  trustee  now  for  a 
number  of  terms,  all  the  same,  —  partly  because  he 
was  their  only  lawyer,  partly  because  he,  like  both 
his  colleagues,  held  a  mortgage  on  the  church 
edifice  and  lot.  In  person,  Mr.  Gorringe  was  a 
slender  man,  with  a  skin  of  a  clear,  uniform  citron 
tint,  black  waving  hair,  and  dark  gray  eyes,  and  a 
thin,  high-featured  face.  He  wore  a  mustache 
and  pointed  chin-tuft ;  and,  though  he  was  of  New 
England  parentage  and  had  never  been  further 
south  than  Ocean  Grove,  he  presented  a  general 
effect  of  old  Mississippian  traditions  and  tastes 
startlingly  at  variance  with  the  standards  of  Dear 
born  County  Methodism.  Nothing  could  con 
vince  some  of  the  elder  sisters  that  he  was  not  a 
drinking  man. 

The  three  visitors  had  completed  their  survey 
of  the  room  now ;  and  Loren  Pierce  emitted  a  dry, 
harsh  little  cough,  as  a  signal  that  business  was 
about  to  begin.  At  this  sou  ad,  Winch  drew  up 
his  feet,  and  Gorringe  untied  a  parcel  of  account- 
books  and  papers  that  he  held  on  his  knee. 
Theron  felt  that  his  countenance  must  be  exhibit 
ing  to  the  assembled  brethren  an  unfortunate  sense 
of  helplessness  in  their  hands.  He  tried  to  look 
more  resolute,  and  forced  his  lips  into  a  smile. 

"  Brother  Gorringe  allus  acts  as  Seckertary," 
said  Erastus  Winch,  beaming  broadly  upon  the 
minister,  as  if  the  mere  mention  of  the  fact  pro- 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

moted  jollity.  "  That 's  it,  Brother  Gorringe,  — 
take  your  seat  at  Brother  Ware's  desk.  Mind  the 
Dominie's  pen  don't  play  tricks  on  you,  an'  start 
off  writin'  out  sermons  instid  of  figgers."  The 
humorist  turned  to  Theron  as  the  lawyer  walked 
over  to  the  desk  at  the  window.  "  I  allus  have  to 
caution  him  about  that,"  he  remarked  with  great 
joviality.  "An'  do  you  look  out  afterwards, 
Brother  Ware,  or  else  you  '11  catch  that  pen  o' 
yours  scribblin'  lawyer's  lingo  in  place  o'  the 
Word." 

Theron  felt  bound  to  exhibit  a  grin  in  acknowl 
edgment  of  this  pleasantry.  The  lawyer's  change 
of  position  had  involved  some  shifting  of  the 
others'  chairs,  and  the  young  minister  found  him 
self  directly  confronted  by  Brother  Pierce 's  hard 
and  colorless  old  visage.  Its  little  eyes  were 
watching  him,  as  through  a  mask,  and  under  their 
influence  the  smile  of  politeness  fled  from  his  lips. 
The  lawyer  on  his  right,  the  cheese-buyer  to  the 
left,  seemed  to  recede  into  distance  as  he  for  the 
moment  returned  the  gaze  of  the  quarryman. 
He  waited  now  for  him  to  speak,  as  if  the  others 
were  of  no  importance. 

"  We  are  a  plain  sort  o'  folks  up  in  these 
parts,"  said  Brother  Pierce,  after  a  slight  further 
pause.  His  voice  was  as  dry  and  rasping  as  his 
cough,  and  its  intonations  were  those  of  author 
ity.  "  We  walk  here,"  he  went  on,  eying  the 
minister  with  a  sour  regard,  "  in  a  meek  an* 

42 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

humble  spirit,  in  the  straight  an'  narrow  way  which 
leadeth  unto  life.  We  ain't  gone  traipshY  after 
strange  gods,  like  some  people  that  call  them 
selves  Methodists  in  other  places.  We  stick  by 
the  Discipline  an'  the  ways  of  our  fathers  in  Israel. 
No  new-fangled  notions  can  go  down  here.  Your 
wife  'd  better  take  them  flowers  out  of  her  bunnit 
afore  next  Sunday." 

Silence  possessed  the  room  for  a  few  moments, 
the  while  Theron,  pale-faced  and  with  brows  knit, 
studied  the  pattern  of  the  ingrain  carpet.  Then 
he  lifted  his  head,  and  nodded  it  in  assent. 
"Yes,"  he  said;  "we  will  do  nothing  by  which 
our  '  brother  stumbleth,  or  is  offended,  or  is  made 
weak.'  " 

Brother  Pierce's  parchment  face  showed  no  sign 
of  surprise  or  pleasure  at  this  easy  submission. 
"  Another  thing  :  We  don't  want  no  book-learnin' 
or  dictionary  words  in  our  pulpit,"  he  went  on 
coldly.  "  Some  folks  may  stomach  'em  ;  we  won't. 
Them  two  sermons  o'  yours,  p'r'aps  they  'd  do 
down  in  some  city  place ;  but  they  're  like  your 
wife's  bunnit  here,  they  're  too  flowery  to  suit 
us.  What  we  want  to  hear  is  the  plain,  old-fash 
ioned  Word  of  God,  without  any  palaver  or  '  hems 
and  ha's.'  They  tell  me  there 's  some  parts 
where  hell 's  treated  as  played-out,  —  where  our 
ministers  don't  like  to  talk  much  about  it  because 
people  don't  want  to  hear  about  it.  Such  preach 
ers  ought  to  be  put  out.  They  ain't  Methodists  at 

43 


all.  What  we  want  here,  sir,  is  straight-out,  flat- 
footed  hell,  —  the  burnin'  lake  o'  fire  an'  brim 
stone.  Pour  it  into  'em,  hot  an'  strong.  We 
can't  have  too  much  of  it.  Work  in  them  awful 
deathbeds  of  Voltaire  an'  Tom  Paine,  with  the 
Devil  right  there  in  the  room,  reachin'  for  'em, 
an'  they  yellin'  for  fright ;  that 's  what  fills  the 
anxious  seat  an'  brings  in  souls  hand  over  fist." 

Theron's  tongue  dallied  for  an  instant  with  the 
temptation  to  comment  upon  these  old-wife  fables, 
which  were  so  dear  to  the  rural  religious  heart 
when  he  and  I  were  boys.  But  it  seemed  wiser 
to  only  nod  again,  and  let  his  mentor  go  on. 

"  We  ain't  had  no  trouble  with  the  Free  Meth 
odists  here,"  continued  Brother  Pierce,  "jest 
because  we  kept  to  the  old  paths,  an'  seek  for 
salvation  in  the  good  old  way.  Everybody  can 
shout  '  Amen  !  '  as  loud  and  as  long  as  the  Spirit 
moves  him,  with  us.  Some  one  was  savin'  you 
thought  we  ought  to  have  a  choir  and  an  organ. 
No,  sirree  !  No  such  torn-foolery  for  us  !  You  '11 
only  stir  up  feelin'  agin  yourself  by  hintin'  at  such 
things.  And  then,  too,  our  folks  don't  take  no 
stock  in  all  that  pack  o'  nonsense  about  science, 
such  as  tellin'  the  age  of  the  earth  by  crackin'  up 
stones.  I  've  b'en  in  the  quarry  line  all  my  life, 
an'  /  know  it 's  all  humbug !  Why,  they  say 
some  folks  are  goin'  round  now  preachin'  that  our 
grandfathers  were  all  monkeys.  That  comes  from 
departin'  from  the  ways  of  our  forefathers,  an' 

44 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

puttin'  in  organs  an'  choirs,  an'  deckin'  our 
women-folks  out  with  gewgaws,  an'  apin'  the 
fashions  of  the  worldly.  I  should  n't  wonder  if 
them  kind  did  have  some  monkey  blood  in  'em. 
You  '11  find  we  're  a  different  sort  here." 

The  young  minister  preserved  silence  for  a  little, 
until  it  became  apparent  that  the  old  trustee  had 
had  his  say  out.  Even  then  he  raised  his  head 
slowly,  and  at  last  made  answer  in  a  hesitating 
and  irresolute  way. 

"  You  have  been  very  frank,"  he  said.  "  I  am 
obliged  to  you.  A  clergyman  coming  to  a  new 
charge  cannot  be  better  served  than  by  having 
laid  before  him  a  clear  statement  of  the  views  and 
—  and  spiritual  tendencies  —  of  his  new  flock, 
quite  at  the  outset.  I  feel  it  to  be  of  especial 
value  in  this  case,  because  I  am  young  in  years 
and  in  my  ministry,  and  am  conscious  of  a  great 
weakness  of  the  flesh.  I  can  see  how  daily  con 
tact  with  a  people  so  attached  to  the  old,  simple, 
primitive  Methodism  of  Wesley  and  Asbury  may 
be  a  source  of  much  strength  to  me.  I  may  take 
it,"  he  added  upon  second  thought,  with  an 
inquiring  glance  at  Mr.  Winch,  "  that  Brother 
Pierce' s  description  of  our  charge,  and  its  tastes 
and  needs,  meets  with  your  approval?" 

Erastus  Winch  nodded  his  head  and  smiled  ex 
pansively.  "  Whatever  Brother  Pierce  says,  goes  ! " 
he  declared.  The  lawyer,  sitting  behind  at  the 
desk  by  the  window,  said  nothing. 

45 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"The  place  is  jest  overrun  with  Irish,"  Brother 
Pierce  began  again.  "  They  've  got  two  Catholic 
churches  here  now  to  our  one,  and  they  do  jest 
as  they  blamed  please  at  the  charter  elections. 
It  'd  be  a  good  idee  to  pitch  into  Catholics  in  gen 
eral  whenever  you  can.  You  could  make  a  hit 
that  way.  I  say  the  State  ought  to  make  'em  pay 
taxes  on  their  church  property.  They  Ve  no  right 
to  be  exempted,  because  they  ain't  Christians  at 
all.  They  're  idolaters,  that 's  what  they  are  !  I 
know  'em!  I  've  had  'em  in  my  quarries  for  years, 
an'  they  ain't  got  no  idee  of  decency  or  fair  dealin'. 
Every  time  the  price  of  stone  went  up,  every  man 
of  'em  would  jine  to  screw  more  wages  out  o'  me. 
Why,  they  used  to  keep  account  o'  the  amount  o' 
business  I  done,  an'  figger  up  my  profits,  an'  have 
the  face  to  come  an'  talk  to  me  about  'em,  as  if 
that  had  anything  to  do  with  wages.  It 's  my 
belief  their  priests  put  'em  up  to  it.  People  don't 
begin  to  reelize,  —  that  church  of  idolatry  '11  be  the 
ruin  o'  this  country,  if  it  ain't  checked  in  time. 
Jest  you  go  at  'em  hammer  'n'  tongs  !  I  've  got 
Eyetalians  in  the  quarries  now.  They  're  sensible 
fellows:  they  know  when  they're  well  off;  a 
dollar  a  day,  an'  they  're  satisfied,  an'  everything 
goes  smooth." 

"  But  they  're  Catholics,  the  same  as  the  Irish," 
suddenly  interjected  the  lawyer,  from  his  place  by 
the  window.  Theron  pricked  up  his  ears  at  the 
sound  of  his  voice.  There  was  an  anti-Pierce  note 

46 


THE  DAMNATION   OF  THERON  WARE 

in  it,  so  to  speak,  which  it  did  him  good  to  hear. 
The  consciousness  of  sympathy  began  on  the 
instant  to  inspire  him  with  courage. 

"  I  know  some  people  say  they  are,"  Brother 
Pierce  guardedly  retorted ;  "  but  I  've  summered 
an'  wintered  both  kinds,  an'  /hold  to  it  they're 
different.  I  grant  ye,  the  Eyetalians  are  some 
given  to  jabbin'  knives  into  each  other,  but  they 
never  git  up  strikes,  an'  they  don't  grumble  about 
wages.  Why,  look  at  the  way  they  live, — jest 
some  weeds  an'  yarbs  dug  up  on  the  roadside,  an* 
stewed  in  a  kettle  with  a  piece  o'  fat  the  size  o' 
your  finger,  an'  a  loaf  o'  bread,  an'  they  're  happy 
as  a  king.  There  's  some  sense  in  that ;  but  the 
Irish,  they  've  got  to  have  meat  an'  potatoes  an' 
butter  jest  as  if — as  if — :> 

"As  if  they'd  b'en  used  to  'em  at  home,"  put 
in  Mr.  Winch,  to  help  his  colleague  out. 

The  lawyer  ostentatiously  drew  up  his  chair  to 
the  desk,  and  began  turning  over  the  leaves  of  his 
biggest  book.  "  It 's  getting  on  toward  noon, 
gentlemen,"  he  said,  in  an  impatient  voice. 

The  business  meeting  which  followed  was  for  a 
considerable  time  confined  to  hearing  extracts 
from  the  books  and  papers  read  in  a  swift  and 
formal  fashion  by  Mr.  Gorringe.  If  this  was 
intended  to  inform  the  new  pastor  of  the  exact 
financial  situation  in  Octavius,  it  lamentably  failed 
of  its  puipose.  Theron  had  little  knowledge  of 
figures;  and  though  he  tried  hard  to  listen, 

47 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  to  assume  an  air  of  comprehension,  he 
did  not  understand  much  of  what  he  heard.  In  a 
general  way  he  gathered  that  the  church  property 
was  put  down  at  $12,000,  on  which  there  was  a 
debt  of  $4,800.  The  annual  expenses  were 
$2,250,  of  which  the  principal  items  were  $800  for 
his  salary,  $170  for  the  rent  of  the  parsonage,  and 
$319  for  interest  on  the  debt.  It  seemed  that  last 
year  the  receipts  had  fallen  just  under  $2,000,  and 
they  now  confronted  the  necessity  of  making  good 
this  deficit  during  the  coming  year,  as  well  as 
increasing  the  regular  revenues.  Without  much 
discussion,  it  was  agreed  that  they  should  endeavor 
to  secure  the  services  of  a  celebrated  "  debt-raiser," 
early  in  the  autumn,  and  utilize  him  in  the  closing 
days  of  a  revival. 

Theron  knew  this  "debt-raiser,"  and  had  seen 
him  at  work,  —  a  burly,  bustling,  vulgar  man  who 
took  possession  of  the  pulpit  as  if  it  were  an  auc 
tioneer's  block,  and  pursued  the  task  of  exciting 
liberality  in  the  bosoms  of  the  congregation  by  alter 
nating  prayer,  anecdote,  song,  and  cheap  buffoonery 
in  a  manner  truly  sickening.  Would  it  not  be  pre 
ferable,  he  feebly  suggested,  to  raise  the  money  by 
a  festival,  or  fair,  or  some  other  form  of  entertain 
ment  which  the  ladies  could  manage  ? 

Brother  Pierce  shook  his  head  with  contempt 
uous  emphasis.  "Our  women-folks  ain't  that 
kind,"  he  said.  "They  did  try  to  hold  a  sociable 
once,  but  nobody  came,  and  we  did  n't  raise 

48 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

more  'n  three  or  four  dollars.  It  ain't  their  line. 
They  lack  the  worldly  arts.  As  the  Discipline 
commands,  they  avoid  the  evil  of  putting  on  gold 
and  costly  apparel,  and  taking  such  diversions  as 
cannot  be  used  in  the  name  of  the  Lord  Jesus." 

"Well — of  course  —  if  you  prefer  the  *  debt- 
raiser  ' —  "Theron  began,  and  took  the  itemized 
account  from  Gorringe's  knee  as  an  excuse  for 
not  finishing  the  hateful  sentence. 

He  looked  down  the  foolscap  sheet,  line  by  line, 
with  no  special  sense  of  what  it  signified,  until  his 
eye  caught  upon  this  little  section  of  the  report, 
bracketed  by  itself  in  the  Secretary's  neat  hand  : 

INTEREST  CHARGE. 

First  mortgage  (1873)  .  .  $1,000  .  .  (E.  Winch)  .  @  7  .  $  70 
Second  mortgage  (1876) .  1,700  .  .  (L.  Gorringe)  @  6 .  102 
Third  mortgage  (1878)  .  2,100  .  .  (L.  Pierce)  . .  @  7  .  147 

$4,800  $319 

It  was  no  news  to  him  that  the  three  mortgages 
on  the  church  property  were  held  by  the  three 
trustees.  But  as  he  looked  once  more,  another 
feature  of  the  thing  struck  him  as  curious. 

"  I  notice  that  the  rates  of  interest  vary,"  he 
remarked  without  thinking,  and  then  wished  the 
words  unsaid,  for  the  two  trustees  in  view  moved 
uneasily  on  their  seats. 

"  Oh,  that 's  nothing,"  exclaimed  Erastus  Winch, 
with  a  boisterous  display  of  jollity.  "  It 's  only 
Brother  Gorringe's  pleasant  little  way  of  making  a 
4  49 


THE   DAMNATION   OF  THERON  WARE 

contribution  to  our  funds.  You  will  notice  that,  at 
the  date  of  all  these  mortgages,  the  State  rate  of 
interest  was  seven  per  cent.  Since  then  it 's  b'en 
lowered  to  six.  Well,  when  that  happened,  you 
see,  Brother  Gorringe,  not  being  a  professin'  mem 
ber,  and  so  not  bound  by  our  rules,  he  could  just 
as  well  as  not  let  his  interest  down  a  cent.  But 
Brother  Pierce  an'  me,  we  talked  it  over,  an'  we 
made  up  our  minds  we  were  tied  hand  an'  foot  by 
our  contract.  You  know  how  strong  the  Discipline 
lays  it  down  that  we  must  be  bound  to  the  letter  of 
our  agreements.  That  bein'  so,  we  seen  it  in  the 
light  of  duty  not  to  change  what  we  'd  set  our  hands 
to.  That 's  how  it  is,  Brother  Ware." 

"  I  understand,"  said  Theron,  with  an  effort  at 
polite  calmness  of  tone.  "And  —  is  there  any 
thing  else  ?  " 

"  There  's  this,"  broke  in  Brother  Pierce  :  "  we're 
commanded  to  be  law-abiding  people,  an'  seven 
per  cent  was  the  law  —  an'  would  be  now  if  them 
ragamuffins  in  the  Legislation  —  " 

"Surely  we  needn't  go  further  into  that,"  in 
terrupted  the  minister,  conscious  of  a  growing 
stiffness  in  his  moral  spine.  "  Have  we  any  other 
business  before  us?" 

Brother  Pierce's  little  eyes  snapped,  and  the 
wrinkles  in  his  forehead  deepened  angrily. 
"Business?"  he  demanded.  " Yes,  plenty  of  it. 
We  've  got  to  reduce  expenses.  We  're  nigh  onto 
$300  behind-hand  this  minute.  Besides  your  house- 
So 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

rent,  you  get  $800  free  an'  clear,  —  that  is  $15.38 
every  week,  an'  only  you  an'  your  wife  to  keep  out 
of  it.  Why,  when  I  was  your  age,  young  man,  and 
after  that  too,  I  was  glad  to  get  $6  a  week." 

"  I  don't  think  my  salary  is  under  discussion, 
Mr.  Pierce — " 

"  Brother  Pierce  !  "  suggested  Winch,  in  a  half- 
chuckling  undertone. 

"  Brother  Pierce,  then  !  "  echoed  Theron,  im 
patiently.  "The  Quarterly  Conference  and  the 
Estimating  Committee  deal  with  that.  The  trus 
tees  have  no  more  to  do  with  it  than  the  man  in 
the  moon." 

"  Come,  come,  Brother  Ware,"  put  in  Erastus 
Winch,  "we  mustn't  have  no  hard  feelin's. 
Brotherly  love  is  what  we  're  all  lookin'  after. 
Brother  Pierce's  meanin'  was  n't  agin  your  drawin* 
your  full  salary,  every  cent  of  it,  only  —  only  there 
are  certain  little  things  connected  with  the  parson 
age  here  that  we  feel  you  ought  to  bear.  F'r  in 
stance,  there  's  the  new  sidewalk  we  had  to  lay  in 
front  of  the  house  here  only  a  month  ago.  Of 
course,  if  the  treasury  was  flush  we  would  n't  say  a 
word  about  it.  An'  then  there  's  the  gas  bill  here. 
Seein'  as  you  get  your  rent  for  nothin',  it  don't 
seem  much  to  ask  that  you  should  see  to  lightin' 
the  place  yourself." 

"  No,  I  don't  think  that  either  is  a  proper 
charge  upon  me,"  interposed  Theron.  "  I  decline 
to  pay  them." 

51 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"We  can  have  the  gas  shut  off,"  remarked 
Brother  Pierce,  coldly. 

"  As  soon  as  you  like,"  responded  the  minister, 
sitting  erect  and  tapping  the  carpet  nervously  with 
his  foot.  "  Only  you  must  understand  that  I  will 
take  the  whole  matter  to  the  Quarterly  Confer 
ence  in  July.  I  already  see  a  good  many  other 
interesting  questions  about  the  financial  manage 
ment  of  this  church  which  might  be  appropriately 
discussed  there." 

"  Oh,  come,  Brother  Ware  !  "  broke  in  Trustee 
Winch,  with  a  somewhat  agitated  assumption  of 
good-feeling.  "  Surely  these  are  matters  we  ought 
to  settle  amongst  ourselves.  We  never  yet  asked 
outsiders  to  meddle  with  our  business  here.  It 's 
our  motto,  Brother  Ware.  I  say,  if  you  Ve  got  a 
motto,  stand  by  it." 

"  Well,  my  motto,"  said  Theron,  "  is  to  be  be 
haved  decently  to  by  those  with  whom  I  have  to 
deal ;  and  I  also  propose  to  stand  by  it." 

Brother  Pierce  rose  gingerly  to  his  feet,  with 
the  hesitation  of  an  old  man  not  sure  about  his 
knees.  When  he  had  straightened  himself,  he  put 
on  his  hat,  and  eyed  the  minister  sternly  from 
beneath  its  brim. 

"The  Lord  gives  us  crosses  grievous  to  our 
natur',"  he  said,  "  an'  we  're  told  to  bear  'em 
cheerfully  as  long  as  they  're  on  our  backs ;  but 
there  ain't  nothin'  said  agin  our  unloadin'  'em 
in  the  ditch  the  minute  we  git  the  chance.  I 

52 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

guess  you  won't  last  here  more  'n  a  twelve 
month." 

He  pulled  his  soft  and  discolored  old  hat  down 
over  his  brows  with  a  significantly  hostile  nod, 
and,  turning,  stumped  toward  the  hall-door  without 
offering  to  shake  hands. 

The  other  trustees  had  risen  likewise,  in  tacit 
recognition  that  the  meeting  was  over.  Winch 
clasped  the  minister's  hand  in  his  own  broad, 
hard  palm,  and  squeezed  it  in  an  exuberant  grip. 
"Don't  mind  his  little  ways,  Brother  Ware,"  he 
urged  in  a  loud,  unctuous  whisper,  with  a  grin 
ning  backward  nod  :  "  he  's  a  trifle  skittish  some 
times  when  you  don't  give  him  free  rein ;  but 
he  's  all  wool  an'  a  yard  wide  when  it  comes  to 
right-down  hard-pan  religion.  My  love  to  Sister 
Ware ;  "  and  he  followed  the  senior  trustee  into 
the  hall. 

Mr.  Gorringe  had  been  tying  up  his  books  and 
papers.  He  came  now  with  the  bulky  parcel 
under  his  arm,  and  his  hat  and  stick  in  the  other 
hand.  He  could  give  little  but  his  thumb  to 
Theron  to  shake.  His  face  wore  a  grave  expres 
sion,  and  not  a  line  relaxed  as,  catching  the 
minister's  look,  he  slowly  covered  his  left  eye  in  a 
deliberate  wink. 

*••••••• 

"Well?  —  and  how  did  it  go  off?"  asked  Alice, 
from  where  she  knelt  by  the  oven  door,  a  few 
minutes  later. 

53 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

For  answer,  Theron  threw  himself  wearily  into 
the  big  old  farm  rocking-chair  on  the  other  side  of 
the  stove,  and  shook  his  head  with  a  lengthened 
sigh. 

"  If  it  was  n't  for  that  man  Gorringe  of  yours," 
he  said  dejectedly,  "  I  think  /  should  feel  like 
going  off — and  learning  a  trade." 


54 


CHAPTER   IV 

ON  the  following  Sunday,  young  Mrs.  Ware 
sat  alone  in  the  preacher's  pew  through  the 
morning  service,  and  everybody  noted  that  the 
roses  had  been  taken  from  her  bonnet.  In  the 
evening  she  was  absent,  and  after  the  doxology 
and  benediction  several  people,  under  the  pretence 
of  solicitude  for  her  health,  tried  to  pump  her 
husband  as  to  the  reason.  He  answered  their 
inquiries  civilly  enough,  but  with  brevity :  she  had 
stayed  at  home  because  she  did  not  feel  like  com 
ing  out,  —  this  and  nothing  more. 

The  congregation  dispersed  under  a  gossip- 
laden  cloud  of  consciousness  that  there  must  be 
something  queer  about  Sister  Ware.  There  was 
a  tolerably  general  agreement,  however,  that  the 
two  sermons  of  the  day  had  been  excellent.  Not 
even  Loren  Pierce's  railing  commentary  on  the 
pastor's  introduction  of  an  outlandish  word  like 
epitome  —  clearly  forbidden  by  the  Discipline's 
injunction  to  plain  language  understood  of  the 
people  —  availed  to  sap  the  satisfaction  of  the 
majority. 

Theron  himself  comprehended  that  he  had 
pleased  the  bulk  of  his  auditors;  the  knowledge 

55 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

left  him  curiously  hot  and  cold.  On  the  one  hand, 
there  was  joy  in  the  apparent  prospect  that  the 
congregation  would  back  him  up  in  a  stand  against 
the  trustees,  if  worst  came  to  worst.  But,  on  the 
other,  the  bonnet  episode  entered  his  soul.  It 
had  been  a  source  of  bitter  humiliation  to  him  to 
see  his  wife  sitting  there  beneath  the  pulpit,  shorn 
by  despotic  order  of  the  adornments  natural  to  her 
pretty  head.  But  he  had  even  greater  pain  in 
contemplating  the  effect  it  had  produced  upon 
Alice  herself.  She  had  said  not  a  word  on  the 
subject,  but  her  every  glance  and  gesture  seemed 
to  him  eloquent  of  deep  feeling  about  it.  He 
made  sure  that  she  blamed  him  for  having  de 
fended  his  own  gas  and  sidewalk  rights  with 
successful  vigor,  but  permitted  the  sacrifice  of  her 
poor  little  inoffensive  roses  without  a  protest.  In 
this  view  of  the  matter,  indeed,  he  blamed  himself. 
Was  it  too  late  to  make  the  error  good?  He 
ventured  a  hint  on  this  Sunday  evening,  when  he 
returned  to  the  parsonage  and  found  her  reading 
an  old  weekly  newspaper  by  the  light  of  the 
kitchen  lamp,  to  the  effect  that  he  fancied  there 
would  be  no  great  danger  in  putting  those  roses 
back  into  her  bonnet.  Without  lifting  her  eyes 
from  the  paper,  she  answered  that  she  had  no 
earthly  desire  to  wear  roses  in  her  bonnet,  and 
went  on  with  her  reading. 

At  breakfast  next  morning  Theron  found  him 
self  in  command  of  an  unusual  fund  of  humorous 

56 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

good  spirits,  and  was  at  pains  to  make  the  most 
of  it,  passing  whimsical  comments  on  subjects 
which  the  opening  day  suggested,  recalling  quaint 
and  comical  memories  of  the  past,  and  striving  his 
best  to  force  Alice  into  a  laugh.  Formerly  her 
merry  temper  had  always  ignited  at  the  merest 
spark  of  gayety.  Now  she  gave  his  jokes  only 
a  dutiful  half-smile,  and  uttered  scarcely  a  word  in 
response  to  his  running  fire  of  talk.  When  the 
meal  was  finished,  she  went  silently  to  work  to 
clear  away  the  dishes. 

Theron  turned  over  in  his  mind  the  project 
of  offering  to  help  her,  as  he  had  done  so  often  in 
those  dear  old  days  when  they  laughingly  began  life 
together.  Something  decided  this  project  in  the 
negative  for  him,  and  after  a  few  lingering  moments 
he  put  on  his  hat  and  went  out  for  a  walk. 

Not  even  the  most  doleful  and  trying  hour  of 
his  bitter  experience  in  Tyre  had  depressed  him 
like  this.  Looking  back  upon  those  past  troubles, 
he  persuaded  himself  that  he  had  borne  them  all 
with  a  light  and  cheerful  heart,  simply  because 
Alice  had  been  one  with  him  in  every  thought  and 
emotion.  How  perfect,  how  ideally  complete, 
their  sympathy  had  always  been !  With  what 
absolute  unity  of  mind  and  soul  they  had  walked 
that  difficult  path  together  !  And  now  —  hence 
forth —  was  it  to  be  different?  The  mere  sugges 
tion  of  such  a  thing  chilled  his  veins.  He  said 
aloud  to  himself  as  he  walked  that  life  would  be 

57 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

an  intolerable  curse  if  Alice  were  to  cease  sharing 
it  with  him  in  every  conceivable  phase. 

He  had  made  his  way  out  of  the  town,  and 
tramped  along  the  country  hill-road  for  a  consider 
able  distance,  before  a  merciful  light  began  to 
lessen  the  shadows  in  the  picture  of  gloom  with 
which  his  mind  tortured  itself.  All  at  once  he 
stopped  short,  lifted  his  head,  and  looked  about 
him.  The  broad  valley  lay  warm  and  tranquil  in 
the  May  sunshine  at  his  feet.  In  the  thicket  up 
the  side-hill  above  him  a  gray  squirrel  was  chatter 
ing  shrilly,  and  the  birds  sang  in  tireless  choral 
confusion.  Theron  smiled,  and  drew  a  long  breath. 
The  gay  clamor  of  the  woodland  songsters,  the 
placid  radiance  of  the  landscape,  were  suddenly 
taken  in  and  made  a  part  of  his  new  mood.  He 
listened,  smiled  once  more,  and  then  started  in  a 
leisurely  way  back  toward  Octavius. 

How  could  he  have  been  so  ridiculous  as  to 
fancy  that  Alice  —  his  Alice  —  had  been  changed 
into  some  one  else  ?  He  marvelled  now  at  his  own 
perverse  folly.  She  was  overworked,  tired  out, 
—  that  was  all.  The  task  of  moving  in,  of  setting 
the  new  household  to  rights,  had  been  too  much 
for  her.  She  must  have  a  rest.  They  must  get  in 
a  hired  girl. 

Once  this  decision  about  a  servant  fixed  itself 
in  the  young  minister's  mind,  it  drove  out  the 
last  vestige  of  discomfort.  He  strode  along  now 
in  great  content,  revolving  idly  a  dozen  different 

58 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

plans  for  gilding  and  beautifying  this  new  life  of 
leisure  into  which  his  sanguine  thoughts  projected 
Alice.  One  of  these  particularly  pleased  him,  and 
waxed  in  definiteness  as  he  turned  it  over  and 
over.  He  would  get  another  piano  for  her,  in 
place  of  that  which  had  been  sacrificed  in  Tyre. 
That  beneficent  modern  invention,  the  instalment 
plan,  made  this  quite  feasible,  —  so  easy,  in  fact, 
that  it  almost  seemed  as  if  he  should  find  his  wife 
playing  on  the  new  instrument  when  he  got  home. 
He  would  stop  in  at  the  music  store  and  see  about 
it  that  very  day. 

Of  course,  now  that  these  important  resolutions 
had  been  taken,  it  would  be  a  good  thing  if  he 
could  do  something  to  bring  in  some  extra  money. 
This  was  by  no  means  a  new  notion.  He  had 
mused  over  the  possibility  in  a  formless  way  ever 
since  that  memorable  discovery  of  indebtedness  in 
Tyre,  and  had  long  ago  recognized  the  hopeless 
ness  of  endeavor  in  every  channel  save  that  of 
literature.  Latterly  his  fancy  had  been  stimulated 
by  reading  an  account  of  the  profits  which  Canon 
Farrar  had  derived  from  his  "  Life  of  Christ."  If 
such  a  book  could  command  such  a  bewildering 
multitude  of  readers,  Theron  felt  that  there  ought 
to  be  a  chance  for  him.  So  clear  did  constant 
rumination  render  this  assumption  that  the  young 
pastor  in  time  had  come  to  regard  this  prospective 
book  of  his  as  a  substantial  asset,  which  could  be 
realized  without  trouble  whenever  he  got  around 
to  it.  59 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

He  had  not,  it  is  true,  gone  to  the  length  of 
seriously  considering  what  should  be  the  subject 
of  his  book.  That  had  not  seemed  to  him  to 
matter  much,  so  long  as  it  was  scriptural.  Famili 
arity  with  the  process  of  extracting  a  fixed  amount 
of  spiritual  and  intellectual  meat  from  any  casual 
text,  week  after  week,  had  given  him  an  idea  that 
any  one  of  many  subjects  would  do,  when  the 
time  came  for  him  to  make  a  choice.  He  realized 
now  that  the  time  for  a  selection  had  arrived,  and 
almost  simultaneously  found  himself  with  a  ready- 
made  decision  in  his  mind.  The  book  should  be 
about  Abraham  ! 

Theron  Ware  was  extremely  interested  in  the 
mechanism  of  his  own  brain,  and  followed  its 
workings  with  a  lively  curiosity.  Nothing  could 
be  more  remarkable,  he  thought,  than  to  thus 
discover  that,  on  the  instant  of  his  formulating  a 
desire  to  know  what  he  should  write  upon,  lo,  and 
behold  !  there  his  mind,  quite  on  its  own  initiative, 
had  the  answer  waiting  for  him  !  When  he  had 
gone  a  little  further,  and  the  powerful  range  of 
possibilities  in  the  son's  revolt  against  the  idolatry 
of  his  father,  the  image-maker,  in  the  exodus  from 
the  unholy  city  of  Ur,  and  in  the  influence  of  the 
new  nomadic  life  upon  the  little  deistic  family 
group,  had  begun  to  unfold  itself  before  him,  he 
felt  that  the  hand  of  Providence  was  plainly  dis 
cernible  in  the  matter.  The  book  was  to  be 
blessed  from  its  very  inception. 

60 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Walking  homeward  briskly  now,  with  his  eyes 
on  the  sidewalk  and  his  mind  all  aglow  with  crowd 
ing  suggestions  for  the  new  work,  and  impatience 
to  be  at  it,  he  came  abruptly  upon  a  group  of  men 
and  boys  who  occupied  the  whole  path,  and  were 
moving  forward  so  noiselessly  that  he  had  not 
heard  them  coming.  He  almost  ran  into  the 
leader  of  this  little  procession,  and  began  a  stam 
mering  apology,  the  final  words  of  which  were  left 
unspoken,  so  solemnly  heedless  of  him  and  his 
talk  were  all  the  faces  he  saw. 

In  the  centre  of  the  group  were  four  working- 
men,  bearing  between  them  an  extemporized  litter 
of  two  poles  and  a  blanket  hastily  secured  across 
them  with  spikes.  Most  of  what  this  litter  held 
was  covered  by  another  blanket,  rounded  in  coarse 
folds  over  a  shapeless  bulk.  From  beneath  its 
farther  end  protruded  a  big  broom-like  black 
beard,  thrown  upward  at  such  an  angle  as  to  hide 
everything  beyond  to  those  in  front.  The  tall 
young  minister,  stepping  aside  and  standing  tip 
toe,  could  see  sloping  downward  behind  this  hedge 
of  beard  a  pinched  and  chalk-like  face,  with  wide- 
open,  staring  eyes.  Its  lips,  of  a  dull  lilac  hue, 
were  moving  ceaselessly,  and  made  a  dry,  clicking 
sound. 

Theron  instinctively  joined  himself  to  those 
who  followed  the  litter,  —  a  motley  dozen  of  street 
idlers,  chiefly  boys.  One  of  these  in  whispers 
explained  to  him  that  the  man  was  one  of  Jerry 

61 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Madden's  workmen  in  the  wagon-shops,  who  had 
been  deployed  to  trim  an  elm-tree  in  front  of  his 
employer's  house,  and,  being  unused  to  such  work, 
had  fallen  from  the  top  and  broken  all  his  bones. 
They  would  have  cared  for  him  at  Madden's 
house,  but  he  had  insisted  upon  being  taken  home. 
His  name  was  MacEvoy,  and  he  was  Joey  Mac- 
Evoy's  father,  and  likewise  Jim's  and  Hughey's 
and  Martin's.  After  a  pause  the  lad,  a  bright- 
eyed,  freckled,  barefooted  wee  Irishman,  volun 
teered  the  further  information  that  his  big  brother 
had  run  to  bring  "  Father  Forbess,"  on  the  chance 
that  he  might  be  in  time  to  administer  "  extry 
munction." 

The  way  of  the  silent  little  procession  led 
through  back  streets  —  where  women  hanging  up 
clothes  in  the  yards  hurried  to  the  gates,  their 
aprons  full  of  clothes-pins,  to  stare  open-mouthed 
at  the  passers-by  —  and  came  to  a  halt  at  last  in 
an  irregular  and  muddy  lane,  before  one  of  a  half 
dozen  shanties  reared  among  the  ash- heaps  and 
de'bris  of  the  town's  most  bedraggled  outskirts. 

A  stout,  middle-aged,  red-armed  woman,  already 
warned  by  some  messenger  of  calamity,  stood 
waiting  on  the  roadside  bank.  There  were  whim 
pering  children  clinging  to  her  skirts,  and  a  sur 
rounding  cluster  of  women  of  the  neighborhood, 
some  of  the  more  elderly  of  whom,  shrivelled  little 
crones  in  tidy  caps,  and  with  their  aprons  to  their 
eyes,  were  beginning  in  a  low-murmured  minor 

62 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  wail  which  presently  should  rise  into  the 
keen  of  death.  Mrs.  MacEvoy  herself  made  no 
moan,  and  her  broad  ruddy  face  was  stern  in  ex 
pression  rather  than  sorrowful.  When  the  litter 
stopped  beside  her,  she  laid  a  hand  for  an  instant 
on  her  husband's  wet  brow,  and  looked  —  one 
could  have  sworn  impassively  —  into  his  staring 
eyes.  Then,  still  without  a  word,  she  waved  the 
bearers  toward  the  door,  and  led  the  way  herself. 

Theron,  somewhat  wonderingly,  found  himself, 
a  minute  later,  inside  a  dark  and  ill- smelling  room, 
the  air  of  which  was  humid  with  the  steam  from  a 
boiler  of  clothes  on  the  stove,  and  not  in  other 
ways  improved  by  the  presence  of  a  jostling  score 
of  women,  all  straining  their  gaze  upon  the  open 
door  of  the  only  other  apartment,  —  the  bed 
chamber.  Through  this  they  could  see  the  work 
men  laying  MacEvoy  on  the  bed,  and  standing 
awkwardly  about  thereafter,  getting  in  the  way  of 
the  wife  and  old  Maggie  Quirk  as  they  strove  to 
remove  the  garments  from  his  crushed  limbs.  As 
the  neighbors  watched  what  could  be  seen  of 
these  proceedings,  they  whispered  among  them 
selves  eulogies  of  the  injured  man's  industry  and 
good  temper,  his  habit  of  bringing  his  money  home 
to  his  wife,  and  the  way  he  kept  his  Father  Ma- 
thew  pledge  and  attended  to  his  religious  duties. 
They  admitted  freely  that,  by  the  light  of  his  ex 
ample,  their  own  husbands  and  sons  left  much  to 
be  desired,  and  from  this  wandered  easily  off  into 

63 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

domestic  digressions  of  their  own.  But  all  the 
while  their  eyes  were  bent  upon  the  bedroom 
door ;  and  Theron  made  out,  after  he  had  grown 
accustomed  to  the  gloom  and  the  smell,  that  many 
of  them  were  telling  their  beads  even  while  they 
kept  the  muttered  conversation  alive.  None  of 
them  paid  any  attention  to  him,  or  seemed  to 
regard  his  presence  there  as  unusual. 

Presently  he  saw  enter  through  the  sunlit  street 
doorway  a  person  of  a  different  class.  The  bright 
light  shone  for  a  passing  instant  upon  a  fashion 
able,  flowered  hat,  and  upon  some  remarkably 
brilliant  shade  of  red  hair  beneath  it.  In  another 
moment  there  had  edged  along  through  the  throng, 
to  almost  within  touch  of  him,  a  tall  young  woman, 
the  owner  of  this  hat  and  wonderful  hair.  She 
was  clad  in  light  and  pleasing  spring  attire,  and 
carried  a  parasol  with  a  long  oxidized  silver  handle 
of  a  quaint  pattern.  She  looked  at  him,  and  he 
saw  that  her  face  was  of  a  lengthened  oval,  with 
a  luminous  rose-tinted  skin,  full  red  lips,  and  big 
brown,  frank  eyes  with  heavy  auburn  lashes.  She 
made  a  grave  little  inclination  of  her  head  toward 
him,  and  he  bowed  in  response.  Since  her  arrival, 
he  noted,  the  chattering  of  the  others  had  entirely 
ceased. 

"  I  followed  the  others  in,  in  the  hope  that  I 
might  be  of  some  assistance,"  he  ventured  to  ex 
plain  to  her  in  a  low  murmur,  feeling  that  at  last 
here  was  some  one  to  whom  an  explanation  of  his 

64 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

presence  in  this  Romish  house  was  due.  "  I  hope 
they  won't  feel  that  I  have  intruded." 

She  nodded  her  head  as  if  she  quite  understood. 
"  They  '11  take  the  will  for  the  deed,"  she  whis 
pered  back.  "  Father  Forbes  will  be  here  in  a 
minute.  Do  you  know  is  it  too  late?  " 

Even  as  she  spoke,  the  outer  doorway  was 
darkened  by  the  commanding  bulk  of  a  new 
comer's  figure.  The  flash  of  a  silk  hat,  and  the 
deferential  way  in  which  the  assembled  neighbors 
fell  back  to  clear  a  passage,  made  his  identity  clear. 
Theron  felt  his  blood  tingle  in  an  unaccustomed 
way  as  this  priest  of  a  strange  church  advanced 
across  the  room,  — a  broad-shouldered,  portly  man 
of  more  than  middle  height,  with  a  shapely,  strong- 
lined  face  of  almost  waxen  pallor,  and  a  firm,  com 
manding  tread.  He  carried  in  his  hands,  besides 
his  hat,  a  small  leather- bound  case.  To  this  and 
to  him  the  women  courtesied  and  bowed  their 
heads  as  he  passed. 

"  Come  with  me,"  whispered  the  tall  girl  with 
the  parasol  to  Theron  ;  and  he  found  himself  push 
ing  along  in  her  wake  until  they  intercepted  the 
priest  just  outside  the  bedroom  door.  She  touched 
Father  Forbes  on  the  arm. 

"Just  to  tell  you  that  I  am  here,"  she  said. 
The  priest  nodded  with  a  grave  face,  and  passed 
into  the  other  room.  In  a  minute  or  two  the 
workmen,  Mrs.  MacEvoy,  and  her  helper  came 
out,  and  the  door  was  shut  behind  them. 

i  65 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  He  is  making  his  confession,"  explained  the 
young  lady.  "Stay  here  for  a  minute." 

She  moved  over  to  where  the  woman  of  the 
house  stood,  glum- faced  and  tearless,  and  whis 
pered  something  to  her.  A  confused  movement 
among  the  crowd  followed,  and  out  of  it  presently 
resulted  a  small  table,  covered  with  a  white  cloth, 
and  bearing  on  it  two  unlighted  candles,  a  basin 
of  water,  and  a  spoon,  which  was  brought  forward 
and  placed  in  readiness  before  the  closed  door. 
Some  of  those  nearest  this  cleared  space  were 
kneeling  now,  and  murmuring  a  low  buzz  of  prayer 
to  the  click  of  beads  on  their  rosaries. 

The  door  opened,  and  Theron  saw  the  priest 
standing  in  the  doorway  with  an  uplifted  hand. 
He  wore  now  a  surplice,  with  a  purple  band  over 
his  shoulders,  and  on  his  pale  face  there  shone  a 
tranquil  and  tender  light. 

One  of  the  workmen  fetched  from  the  stove  a 
brand,  lighted  the  two  candles,  and  bore  the  table 
with  its  contents  into  the  bedroom.  The  young 
woman  plucked  Theron's  sleeve,  and  he  dumbly 
followed  her  into  the  chamber  of  death,  making 
one  of  the  group  of  a  dozen,  headed  by  Mrs. 
MacEvoy  and  her  children,  which  rilled  the  little 
room,  and  overflowed  now  outward  to  the  street 
door.  He  found  himself  bowing  with  the  others 
to  receive  the  sprinkled  holy  water  from  the  priest's 
white  ringers;  kneeling  with  the  others  for  the 
prayers;  following  in  impressed  silence  with  the 

66 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

others  the  strange  ceremonial  by  which  the  priest 
traced  crosses  of  holy  oil  with  his  thumb  upon 
the  eyes,  ears,  nostrils,  lips,  hands,  and  feet  of  the 
dying  man,  wiping  off  the  oil  with  a  piece  of 
cotton-batting  each  time  after  he  had  repeated 
the  invocation  to  forgiveness  for  that  particular 
sense.  But  most  of  all  he  was  moved  by  the  rich, 
novel  sound  of  the  Latin  as  the  priest  rolled  it 
forth  in  the  Asperges  me,  Do  mine,  and  Misereatur 
vestri  omnipotens  Deus,  with  its  soft  Continental 
vowels  and  liquid  r*s.  It  seemed  to  him  that  he 
had  never  really  heard  Latin  before.  Then  the 
astonishing  young  woman  with  the  red  hair  de 
claimed  the  Confiteor,  vigorously  and  with  a  reso 
nant  distinctness  of  enunciation.  It  was  a  different 
Latin,  harsher  and  more  sonorous ;  and  while  it 
still  dominated  the  murmured  undertone  of  the 
other's  prayers,  the  last  moment  came. 

Theron  had  stood  face  to  face  with  death  at 
many  other  bedsides ;  no  other  final  scene  had 
stirred  him  like  this.  It  must  have  been  the  girl's 
Latin  chant,  with  its  clanging  reiteration  of  the 
great  names,  —  beatum  Michaelem  Archangelum, 
beatum  Joannem  Baptistam>  sanctos  Apostolos 
Petrum  et  Paulum,  —  invoked  with  such  proud 
confidence  in  this  squalid  little  shanty,  which  so 
strangely  affected  him. 

He  came  out  with  the  others  at  last,  —  the 
candles  and  the  folded  hands  over  the  crucifix 
left  behind,  —  and  walked  as  one  in  a  dream. 

6? 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Even  by  the  time  that  he  had  gained  the  outer 
doorway,  and  stood  blinking  at  the  bright  light 
and  filling  his  lungs  with  honest  air  once  more, 
it  had  begun  to  seem  incredible  to  him  that  he 
had  seen  and  done  all  this. 


68 


CHAPTER  V 

WHILE  Mr.  Ware  stood  thus  on  the  doorstep, 
through  a  minute  of  formless  musing,  the  priest 
and  the  girl  came  out,  and,  somewhat  to  his  con 
fusion,  made  him  one  of  their  party.  He  felt 
himself  flushing  under  the  idea  that  they  would 
think  he  had  waited  for  them- — was  thrusting 
himself  upon  them.  The  notion  prompted  him 
to  bow  frigidly  in  response  to  Father  Forbes' 
pleasant  "I  am  glad  to  meet  you,  sir,"  and  his 
outstretched  hand. 

"  I  dropped  in  by  the  —  the  merest  accident," 
Theron  said.  "I  met  them  bringing  the  poor 
man  home,  and  —  and  quite  without  thinking,  I 
obeyed  the  impulse  to  follow  them  in,  and  did  n't 
realize  —  " 

He  stopped  short,  annoyed  by  the  reflection 
that  this  was  his  second  apology.  The  girl  smiled 
placidly  at  him,  the  while  she  put  up  her  parasol. 

"  It  did  me  good  to  see  you  there,"  she  said, 
quite  as  if  she  had  known  him  all  her  life.  "  And 
so  it  did  the  rest  of  us." 

Father  Forbes  permitted  himself  a  soft  little 
chuckle,  approving  rather  than  mirthful,  and 
patted  her  on  the  shoulder  with  the  air  of  being 
fifty  years  her  senior  instead  of  fifteen.  To  the 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

minister's  relief,  he  changed  the  subject  as  the 
three  started  together  toward  the  road. 

"Then,  again,  no  doctor  was  sent  for!"  he 
exclaimed,  as  if  resuming  a  familiar  subject  with 
the  girl.  Then  he  turned  to  Theron.  "  I  dare 
say  you  have  no  such  trouble  ;  but  with  our  poorer 
people  it  is  very  vexing.  They  will  not  call  in  a 
physician,  but  hurry  off  first  for  the  clergyman. 
I  don't  know  that  it  is  altogether  to  avoid  doctor's 
bills,  but  it  amounts  to  that  in  effect.  Of  course 
in  this  case  it  made  no  difference ;  but  I  have  had 
to  make  it  a  rule  not  to  go  out  at  night  unless  they 
bring  me  a  physician's  card  with  his  assurance  that 
it  is  a  genuine  affair.  Why,  only  last  winter,  I  was 
routed  up  after  midnight,  and  brought  off  in  the 
mud  and  pelting  rain  up  one  of  the  new  streets 
on  the  hillside  there,  simply  because  a  factory  girl 
who  was  laced  too  tight  had  fainted  at  a  dance. 
I  slipped  and  fell  into  a  puddle  in  the  darkness, 
ruined  a  new  overcoat,  and  got  drenched  to  the 
skin ;  and  when  I  arrived  the  girl  had  recovered 
and  was  dancing  away  again,  thirteen  to  the  dozen. 
It  was  then  that  I  made  the  rule.  I  hope,  Mr. 
Ware,  that  Octavius  is  producing  a  pleasant  im 
pression  upon  you  so  far?" 

"  I  scarcely  know  yet,"  answered  Theron.  The 
genial  talk  of  the  priest,  with  its  whimsical  anec 
dote,  had  in  truth  passed  over  his  head.  His 
mind  still  had  room  for  nothing  but  that  novel 
death-bed  scene,  with  the  winged  captain  of  the 

70 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

angelic  host,  the  Baptist,  the  glorified  Fisherman, 
and  the  Preacher,  all  being  summoned  down  in 
the  pomp  of  liturgical  Latin  to  help  MacEvoy  to 
die.  "  If  you  don't  mind  my  saying  so,"  he  added 
hesitatingly,  "what  I  have  just  seen  in  there  did 
make  a  very  powerful  impression  upon  me." 

"  It  is  a  very  ancient  ceremony,"  said  the 
priest ;  "  probably  Persian,  like  the  baptismal  form, 
although,  for  that  matter,  we  can  never  dig  deep 
enough  for  the  roots  of  these  things.  They  all 
turn  up  Turanian  if  we  probe  far  enough.  Our 
ways  separate  here,  I  'm  afraid.  I  am  delighted 
to  have  made  your  acquaintance,  Mr.  Ware.  Pray 
look  in  upon  me,  if  you  can  as  well  as  not.  We 
are  near  neighbors,  you  know." 

Father  Forbes  had  shaken  hands,  and  moved 
off  up  another  street  some  distance,  before  the 
voice  of  the  girl  recalled  Theron  to  himself. 

"  Of  course  you  knew  him  by  name,"  she  was  say 
ing,  "  and  he  knew  you  by  sight,  and  had  talked  of 
you ;  but  my  poor  inferior  sex  has  to  be  introduced. 
I  am  Celia  Madden.  My  father  has  the  wagon- 
shops,  and  I  —  I  play  the  organ  at  the  church." 

"I  —  I  am  delighted  to  make  your  acquaint 
ance,"  said  Theron,  conscious  as  he  spoke  that  he 
had  slavishly  echoed  the  formula  of  the  priest. 
He  could  think  of  nothing  better  to  add  than, 
"  Unfortunately,  we  have  no  organ  in  our  church." 

The  girl  laughed,  as  they  resumed  their  walk 
down  the  street.  "  I  'm  afraid  I  could  n't  under- 

7* 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

take  two,"  she  said,  and  laughed  again.  Then 
she  spoke  more  seriously.  "  That  ceremony  must 
have  interested  you  a  good  deal,  never  having 
seen  it  before.  I  saw  that  it  was  all  new  to  you, 
and  so  I  made  bold  to  take  you  under  my  wing, 
so  to  speak." 

"  You  were  very  kind,"  said  the  young  minister. 
"  It  was  really  a  great  experience  for  me.  May — 
may  I  ask,  is  it  a  part  of  your  functions,  in  the 
church,  I  mean,  to  attend  these  last  rites?" 

"  Mercy,  no  !  "  replied  the  girl,  spinning  the 
parasol  on  her  shoulder  and  smiling  at  the  thought. 
"  No ;  it  was  only  because  MacEvoy  was  one  of 
our  workmen,  and  really  came  by  his  death  through 
father  sending  him  up  to  trim  a  tree.  Ann  Mac 
Evoy  will  never  forgive  us  that,  the  longed  day  she 
lives.  Did  you  notice  her?  She  wouldn't  speak 
to  me.  After  you  came  out,  I  tried  to  tell  her 
that  we  would  look  out  for  her  and  the  children ; 
but  all  she  would  say  to  me  was :  '  An'  fwat  would 
a  wheelwright,  an'  him  the  father  of  a  family,  be 
doin'  up  a  tree  ? '  " 

They  had  come  now  upon  the  main  street  of 
the  village,  with  its  flagstone  sidewalk  overhung 
by  a  lofty  canopy  of  elm-boughs.  Here,  for  the 
space  of  a  block,  was  concentrated  such  fashion 
able  elegance  of  mansions  and  ornamental  lawns 
as  Octavius  had  to  offer ;  and  it  was  presented 
with  the  irregularity  so  characteristic  of  our  restless 
civilization.  Two  or  three  of  the  houses  survived 

72 


untouched  from  the  earlier  days,  —  prim,  decorous 
structures,  each  with  its  gabled  centre  and  lower 
wings,,  each  with  its  row  of  fluted  columns  support 
ing  the  classical  roof  of  a  piazza  across  its  whole 
front,  each  vying  with  the  others  in  the  whiteness 
of  those  wooden  walls  enveloping  its  bright  green 
blinds.  One  had  to  look  over  picket  fences  to 
see  these  houses,  and  in  doing  so  caught  the 
notion  that  they  thus  railed  themselves  off  in  pride 
at  being  able  to  remember  before  the  railroad 
came  to  the  village,  or  the  wagon-works  were 
thought  of. 

Before  the  neighboring  properties  the  fences 
had  been  swept  away,  so  that  one  might  stroll 
from  the  sidewalk  straight  across  the  well-trimmed 
sward  to  any  one  of  a  dozen  elaborately  modern 
doorways.  Some  of  the  residences,  thus  frankly 
proffering  friendship  to  the  passer-by,  were  of 
wood  painted  in  drabs  and  dusky  reds,  with  bulg 
ing  windows  which  marked  the  native  yearning 
for  the  mediaeval,  and  shingles  that  strove  to  be 
accounted  tiles.  Others  —  a  prouder,  less  preten 
tious  sort  —  were  of  brick  or  stone,  with  terra-cotta 
mouldings  set  into  the  walls,  and  with  real  slates 
covering  the  riot  of  turrets  and  peaks  and  dormer 
peepholes  overhead. 

Celia  Madden  stopped  in  front  of  the  largest 
and  most  important-looking  of  these  new  edifices, 
and  said,  holding  out  her  hand :  "  Here  I  am, 
once  more.  Good-morning,  Mr.  Ware." 

T  "y 

/3 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Theron  hoped  that  his  manner  did  not  betray 
the  flash  of  surprise  he  felt  in  discovering  that  his 
new  acquaintance  lived  in  the  biggest  house  in 
Octavius.  He  remembered  now  that  some  one 
had  pointed  it  out  as  the  abode  of  the  owner  of 
the  wagon  factories ;  but  it  had  not  occurred  to 
him  before  to  associate  this  girl  with  that  village 
magnate.  It  was  stupid  of  him,  of  course,  because 
she  had  herself  mentioned  her  father.  He  looked 
at  her  again  with  an  awkward  smile,  as  he  formally 
shook  the  gloved  hand  she  gave  him,  and  lifted 
his  soft  hat.  The  strong  noon  sunlight,"  forcing  its 
way  down  between  the  elms,  and  beating  upon 
her  parasol  of  lace- edged,  creamy  silk,  made  a  halo 
about  her  hair  and  face  at  once  brilliant  and 
tender.  He  had  not  seen  before  how  beautiful 
she  was.  She  nodded  in  recognition  of  his  salute, 
and  moved  up  the  lawn  walk,  spinning  the  sunshade 
on  her  shoulder. 

Though  the  parsonage  was  only  three  blocks 
away,  the  young  minister  had  time  to  think  about 
a  good  many  things  before  he  reached  home. 

First  of  all,  he  had  to  revise  in  part  the  arrange 
ment  of  his  notions  about  the  Irish.  Save  for  an 
occasional  isolated  and  taciturn  figure  among  the 
nomadic  portion  of  the  hired  help  in  the  farm 
country,  Theron  had  scarcely  ever  spoken  to  a 
person  of  this  curiously  alien  race  before.  He 
remembered  now  that  there  had  been  some  dozen 
or  more  Irish  families  in  Tyre,  quartered  in  the 

74 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

outskirts  among  the  brickyards,  but  he  had  never 
come  in  contact  with  any  of  them,  or  given  to  their 
existence  even  a  passing  thought.  So  far  as  per 
sonal  acquaintance  went,  the  Irish  had  been  to 
him  only  a  name. 

But  what  a  sinister  and  repellent  name  !  His 
views  on  this  general  subject  were  merely  those 
common  to  his  communion  and  his  environment. 
He  took  it  for  granted,  for  example,  that  in  the 
large  cities  most  of  the  poverty  and  all  the  drunk 
enness,  crime,  and  political  corruption  were  due 
to  the  perverse  qualities  of  this  foreign  people,  — 
qualities  accentuated  and  emphasized  in  every  evil 
direction  by  the  baleful  influence  of  a  false  and 
idolatrous  religion.  It  is  hardly  too  much  to  say  that 
he  had  never  encountered  a  dissenting  opinion  on 
this  point.  His  boyhood  had  been  spent  in  those 
bitter  days  when  social,  political,  and  blood  preju 
dices  were  fused  at  white  heat  in  the  public  crucible 
together.  When  he  went  to  the  Church  Seminary, 
it  was  a  matter  of  course  that  every  member  of  the 
faculty  was  a  Republican,  and  that  every  one  of  his 
classmates  had  come  from  a  Republican  household. 
When,  later  on,  he  entered  the  ministry,  the  rule 
was  still  incredulous  of  exceptions.  One  might  as 
well  have  looked  in  the  Nedahma  Conference  for 
a  divergence  of  opinion  on  the  Trinity  as  for  a 
difference  in  political  conviction.  Indeed,  even 
among  the  laity,  Theron  could  not  feel  sure  that 
he  had  ever  known  a  Democrat;  that  is,  at  all 

75 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

closely.  He  understood  very  little  about  politics, 
it  is  true.  If  he  had  been  driven  into  a  corner, 
and  forced  to  attempt  an  explanation  of  this  tre 
mendous  partisan  unanimity  in  which  he  had  a 
share,  he  would  probably  have  first  mentioned  the 
War,  —  the  last  shots  of  which  were  fired  while  he 
was  still  in  petticoats.  Certainly  his  second  reason, 
however,  would  have  been  that  the  Irish  were  on 
the  other  side. 

He  had  never  before  had  occasion  to  formulate, 
even  in  his  own  thoughts,  this  tacit  race  and 
religious  aversion  in  which  he  had  been  bred.  It 
rose  now  suddenly  in  front  of  him,  as  he  sauntered 
from  patch  to  patch  of  sunlight  under  the  elms, 
like  some  huge,  shadowy,  and  symbolical  monu 
ment.  He  looked  at  it  with  wondering  curiosity, 
as  at  something  he  had  heard  of  all  his  life,  but 
never  seen  before,  —  an  abhorrent  spectacle,  truly  ! 
The  foundations  upon  which  its  dark  bulk  reared 
itself  were  ignorance,  squalor,  brutality,  and  vice. 
Pigs  wallowed  in  the  mire  before  its  base,  and 
burrowing  into  this  base  were  a  myriad  of  narrow 
doors,  each  bearing  the  hateful  sign  of  a  saloon, 
and  giving  forth  from  its  recesses  of  night  the 
sounds  of  screams  and  curses.  Above  were  sculp 
tured  rows  of  lowering,  ape-like  faces  from  Nast's 
and  Keppler's  cartoons,  and  out  of  these  sprang 
into  the  vague  upper  gloom,  on  the  one  side, 
lamp-posts  from  which  negroes  hung  by  the  neck, 
and  on  the  other  gibbets  for  dynamiters  and  Molly 

76 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Maguires ;  and  between  the  two  glowed  a  spec 
tral  picture  of  some  black-robed,  tonsured  men, 
with  leering  satanic  masks,  making  a  bonfire  of 
the  Bible  in  the  public  schools. 

Theron  stared  this  phantasm  hard  in  the  face, 
and  recognized  it  for  a  very  tolerable  embodiment 
of  what  he  had  heretofore  supposed  he  thought 
about  the  Irish.  For  an  instant,  the  sight  of  it 
-made  him  shiver,  as  if  the  sunny  May  had  of  a 
sudden  lapsed  into  bleak  December.  Then  he 
smiled,  and  the  bad  vision  went  off  into  space. 
He  saw  instead  Father  Forbes,  in  the  white  and 
purple  vestments,  standing  by  poor  MacEvoy's 
bedside,  with  his  pale,  chiselled,  luminous,  uplifted 
face,  and  he  heard  only  the  proud,  confident 
clanging  of  the  girl's  recital,  —  beatum  Michaelem 
Archangelum,  beatum  Joannem  Baptistam,  Petrum 
et  Paulum  —  em  !  am  !  urn  !  —  like  strokes  on  a 
great  resonant  alarm-bell,  attuned  for  the  hearing 
of  heaven.  He  caught  himself  on  the  very  verge 
of  feeling  that  heaven  must  have  heard. 

Then  he  smiled  again,  and  laid  the  matter  aside, 
with  a  parting  admission  that  it  had  been  undoubt 
edly  picturesque  and  impressive,  and  that  it  had 
been  a  valuable  experience  to  him  to  see  it.  At 
least  the  Irish,  with  all  their  faults,  must  have  a 
poetic  strain,  or  they  would  not  have  clung  so  tena 
ciously  to  those  curious  and  ancient  forms.  He 
recalled  having  heard  somewhere,  or  read,  it  might 
be,  that  they  were  a  people  much  given  to  songs 

77 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  music.  And  the  young  lady,  that  very  hand 
some  and  friendly  Miss  Madden,  had  told  him  that 
she  was  a  musician  !  He  had  a  new  pleasure  in 
turning  this  over  in  his  mind.  Of  all  the  closed 
doors  which  his  choice  of  a  career  had  left  along 
his  pathway,  no  other  had  for  him  such  a  magical 
fascination  as  that  on  which  was  graven  the  lute  of 
Orpheus.  He  knew  not  even  the  alphabet  of 
music,  and  his  conceptions  of  its  possibilities  ran 
but  little  beyond  the  best  of  the  hymn-singing  he 
had  heard  at  Conferences,  yet  none  the  less  the 
longing  for  it  raised  on  occasion  such  mutiny  in 
his  soul  that  more  than  once  he  had  specifically 
prayed  against  it  as  a  temptation. 

Dangerous  though  some  of  its  tendencies  might 
be,  there  was  no  gainsaying  the  fact  that  a  love  for 
music  was  in  the  main  an  uplifting  influence, — 
an  attribute  of  cultivation.  The  world  was  the 
sweeter  and  more  gentle  for  it.  And  this  brought 
him  to  musing  upon  the  odd  chance  that  the  two 
people  of  Octavius  who  had  given  him  the  first 
notion  of  polish  and  intellectual  culture  in  the 
town  should  be  Irish.  The  Romish  priest  must 
have  been  vastly  surprised  at  his  intrusion,  yet  had 
been  at  the  greatest  pains  to  act  as  if  it  were  quite 
the  usual  thing  to  have  Methodist  ministers  assist 
at  Extreme  Unction.  And  the  young  woman,  — 
how  gracefully,  with  what  delicacy,  had  she  com 
prehended  his  position  and  robbed  it  of  all  its 
possible  embarrassments  !  It  occurred  to  him  that 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

they  must  have  passed,  there  in  front  of  her  home, 
the  very  tree  from  which  the  luckless  wheelwright 
had  fallen  some  hours  before  ;  and  the  fact  that  she 
had  forborne  to  point  it  out  to  him  took  form  in 
his  mind  as  an  added  proof  of  her  refinement  of 
nature. 

The  midday  dinner  was  a  little  more  than  ready 
when  Theron  reached  home,  and  let  himself  in  by 
the  front  door.  On  Mondays,  owing  to  the  mois 
ture  and  "  clutter  "  of  the  weekly  washing  in  the 
kitchen,  the  table  was  laid  in  the  sitting-room,  and 
as  he  entered  from  the  hall  the  partner  of  his  joys 
bustled  in  by  the  other  door,  bearing  the  steaming 
platter  of  corned  beef,  dumplings,  cabbages,  and 
carrots,  with  arms  bared  to  the  elbows,  and  a  red 
face.  It  gave  him  great  comfort,  however,  to  note 
that  there  were  no  signs  of  the  morning's  displeas 
ure  remaining  on  this  face ;  and  he  immediately 
remembered  again  those  interrupted  projects  of 
his  about  the  piano  and  the  hired  girl. 

"  Well !  I  'd  just  about  begun  to  reckon  that  I 
was  a  widow,"  said  Alice,  putting  down  her  fragrant 
burden.  There  was  such  an  obvious  suggestion  of 
propitiation  in  her  tone  that  Theron  went  around 
and  kissed  her.  He  thought  of  saying  something 
about  keeping  out  of  the  way  because  it  was  "  Blue 
Monday,"  but  held  it  back  lest  it  should  sound  like 
a  reproach. 

"  Well,  what  kind  of  a  washerwoman  does  this  one 
turn  out  to  be?  "  he  asked,  after  they  were  seated.. 

79 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  he  had  invoked  a  blessing  and  was   cutting 
vigorously  into  the  meat. 

"  Oh,  so-so,"  replied  Alice ;  "  she  seems  to  be 
particular,  but  she  's  mortal  slow.  If  I  had  n't  stood 
right  over  her,  we  shouldn't  have  had  the  clothes 
out  till  goodness  knows  when.  And  of  course  she  's 
Irish!" 

"Well,  what  of  that?"  asked  the  minister,  with 
a  fine  unconcern. 

Alice  looked  up  from  her  plate,  with  knife  and 
fork  suspended  in  air.  "  Why,  you  know  we  were 
talking  only  the  other  day  of  what  a  pity  it  was  that 
none  of  our  own  people  went  out  washing,"  she 
said.  "  That  Welsh  woman  we  heard  of  could  n't 
come,  after  all ;  and  they  say,  too,  that  she  pre 
sumes  dreadfully  upon  the  acquaintance,  being  a 
church  member,  you  know.  So  we  simply  had  to 
fall  back  on  the  Irish.  And  even  if  they  do  go  and 
tell  their  priest  everything  they  see  and  hear,  why, 
there  's  one  comfort,  they  can  tell  about  us  and 
welcome.  Of  course  I  see  to  it  she  does  n't  snoop 
around  in  here." 

Theron  smiled.  "That's  all  nonsense  about 
their  telling  such  things  to  their  priests,"  he  said 
with  easy  confidence. 

"  Why,  you  told  me  so  yourself,  "  replied  Alice, 
briskly.  "  And  I  've  always  understood  so,  too ; 
they  're  bound  to  tell  everything  in  confession. 
That 's  what  gives  the  Catholic  Church  such  a 
tremendous  hold.  You  Ve  spoken  of  it  often." 

80 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  It  must  have  been  by  way  of  a  figure  of  speech," 
remarked  Theron,  not  with  entire  directness. 
"  Women  are  great  hands  to  separate  one's  obser 
vations  from  their  context,  and  so  give  them  mean 
ings  quite  unintended.  They  are  also  great  hands," 
he  added  genially,  "  or  at  least  one  of  them  is, 
at  making  the  most  delicious  dumplings  in  the  world. 
I  believe  these  are  the  best  even  you  ever  made." 

Alice  was  not  unmindful  of  the  compliment,  but 
her  thoughts  were  on  other  things.  "  I  should  n't 
like  that  woman's  priest,  for  example,"  she  said,  "  to 
know  that  we  had  no  piano." 

"  But  if  he  comes  and  stands  outside  our  house 
every  night  and  listens, — as  of  course  he  will," 
said  Theron,  with  mock  gravity,  "  it  is  only  a 
question  of  time  when  he  must  reach  that  conclu 
sion  for  himself.  Our  only  chance,  however,  is  that 
there  are  some  sixteen  hundred  other  houses  for 
him  to  watch,  so  that  he  may  not  get  around  to  us 
for  quite  a  spell.  Why,  seriously,  Alice,  what  on 
earth  do  you  suppose  Father  Forbes  knows  or  cares 
about  our  poor  little  affairs,  or  those  of  any  other 
Protestant  household  in  this  whole  village  ?  He  has 
his  work  to  do,  just  as  I  have  mine,  —  only  his  is 
ten  times  as  exacting  in  everything  except  sermons, 
—  and  you  may  be  sure  he  is  only  too  glad  when 
it  is  over  each  day,  without  bothering  about  things 
that  are  none  of  his  business." 

"  All  the  same,  I  'm  afraid  of  them,"  said  Alice, 
as  if  argument  were  exhausted. 
6  81 


CHAPTER  VI 

ON  the  following  morning  young  Mr.  Ware  anti 
cipated  events  by  inscribing  in  his  diary  for  the 
day,  immediately  after  breakfast,  these  remarks : 
"  Arranged  about  piano.  Began  work  upon  book." 

The  date  indeed  deserved  to  be  distinguished 
from  its  fellows.  Theron  was  so  conscious  of  its 
importance  that  he  not  only  prophesied  in  the  little 
morocco-bound  diary  which  Alice  had  given  him 
for  Christmas,  but  returned  after  he  had  got  out 
upon  the  front  steps  of  the  parsonage  to  have  his 
hat  brushed  afresh  by  her. 

"  Wonders  will  never  cease,"  she  said  jocosely. 
"  With  you  getting  particular  about  your  clothes, 
there  is  n't  anything  in  this  wide  world  that  can't 
happen  now  !  " 

"One  doesn't  go  out  to  bring  home  a  piano 
every  day,"  he  made  answer.  "  Besides,  I  want  to 
make  such  an  impression  upon  the  man  that  he 
will  deal  gently  with  that  first  cash  payment  down. 
Do  you  know,"  he  added,  watching  her  turn  the 
felt  brim  under  the  wisp-broom's  strokes,  "  I  'm 
thinking  some  of  getting  me  a  regular  silk  stove 
pipe  hat." 

82 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  Why  don't  you,  then?  "  she  rejoined,  but  with 
out  any  ring  of  glad  acquiescence  in  her  tone.  He 
fancied  that  her  face  lengthened  a  little,  and  he 
instantly  ascribed  it  to  recollections  of  the  way  in 
which  the  roses  had  been  bullied  out  of  her  own 
headgear. 

"  You  are  quite  sure,  now,  pet,"  he  made  haste 
to  change  the  subject,  "  that  the  hired  girl  can  wait 
just  as  well  as  not  until  fall?  " 

"  Oh,  my,  yes  !  "  Alice  replied,  putting  the  hat  on 
his  head,  and  smoothing  back  his  hair  behind  his 
ears.  "  She  'd  only  be  in  the  way  now.  You  see, 
with  hot  weather  coming  on,  there  won't  be  much 
cooking.  We  '11  take  all  our  meals  out  here,  and 
that  saves  so  much  work  that  really  what  remains  is 
hardly  more  than  taking  care  of  a  bird-cage.  And, 
besides,  not  having  her  will  almost  half  pay  for  the 
piano." 

"  But  when  cold  weather  comes,  you  're  sure 
you  '11  consent?  "  he  urged. 

"  Like  a  shot !  "  she  assured  him,  and,  after  a 
happy  little  caress,  he  started  out  again  on  his 
momentous  mission. 

"  Thurston's "  was  a  place  concerning  which 
opinions  differed  in  Octavius.  That  it  typified 
progress,  and  helped  more  than  any  other  feature 
of  the  village  to  bring  it  up  to  date,  no  one  indeed 
disputed.  One  might  move  about  a  great  deal,  in 
truth,  and  hear  no  other  view  expressed.  But  then 
again  one  might  stumble  into  conversation  with  one 

83 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

small  storekeeper  after  another,  and  learn  that  they 
united  in  resenting  the  existence  of  '•'  Thurston's," 
as  rival  farmers  might  join  to  curse  a  protracted 
drought.  Each  had  his  special  flaming  grievance. 
The  little  dry-goods  dealers  asked  mournfully  how 
they  could  be  expected  to  compete  with  an  estab 
lishment  which  could  buy  bankrupt  stocks  at  a 
hundred  different  points,  and  make  a  profit  if  only 
one-third  of  the  articles  were  sold  for  more  than 
they  would  cost  from  the  jobber?  The  little  boot 
and  shoe  dealers,  clothiers,  hatters,  and  furriers,  the 
small  merchants  in  carpets,  crockery,  and  furniture, 
the  venders  of  hardware  and  household  utensils,  of 
leathern  goods  and  picture-frames,  of  wall-paper, 
musical  instruments,  and  even  toys,  —  all  had  the 
same  pathetically  unanswerable  question  to  pro 
pound.  But  mostly  they  put  it  to  themselves, 
because  the  others  were  at  "  Thurston's." 

The  Rev.  Theron  Ware  had  entertained  rather 
strong  views  on  this  subject,  and  that  only  a  week 
or  two  ago.  One  of  his  first  acquaintances  in 
Octavius  had  been  the  owner  of  the  principal 
book-store  in  the  place,  —  a  gentle  and  bald  old 
man  who  produced  the  complete  impression  of  a 
bibliophile  upon  what  the  slightest  investigation 
showed  to  be  only  a  meagre  acquaintance  with 
publishers'  circulars.  But  at  least  he  had  the  air 
of  loving  his  business,  and  the  young  minister  had 
enjoyed  a  long  talk  with,  or  rather,  at  him.  Out 
of  this  talk  had  come  the  information  that  the 

84 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

store  was  losing  money.  Not  even  the  stationery 
department  now  showed  a  profit  worth  mentioning. 
When  Octavius  had  contained  only  five  thousand 
inhabitants,  it  boasted  four  book-stores,  two  of 
them  good  ones.  Now,  with  a  population  more 
than  doubled,  only  these  latter  two  survived,  and 
they  must  soon  go  to  the  wall.  The  reason?  It 
was  in  a  nutshell.  A  book  which  sold  at  retail 
for  one  dollar  and  a  half  cost  the  bookseller 
ninety  cents.  If  it  was  at  all  a  popular  book, 
"  Thurston's  "  advertised  it  at  eighty-nine  cents,  — 
and  in  any  case  at  a  profit  of  only  two  or  three 
cents.  Of  course  it  was  done  to  widen  the  estab 
lishment's  patronage,  —  to  bring  people  into  the 
store.  Equally  of  course,  it  was  destroying  the 
book  business  and  debauching  the  reading  tastes 
of  the  community.  Without  the  profits  from  the 
light  and  ephemeral  popular  literature  of  the  sea 
son,  the  book-store  proper  could  not  keep  up  its 
stock  of  more  solid  works,  and  indeed  could  not 
long  keep  open  at  all.  On  the  other  hand,  "  Thur 
ston's  "  dealt  with  nothing  save  the  demand  of  the 
moment,  and  offered  only  the  books  which  were 
the  talk  of  the  week.  Thus,  in  plain  words,  the 
book  trade  was  going  to  the  dogs,  and  it  was  the 
same  with  pretty  nearly  every  other  trade. 

Theron  was  indignant  at  this,  and  on  his  return 
home  told  Alice  that  he  desired  her  to  make  no 
purchases  whatever  at  "  Thurston's."  He  even 
resolved  to  preach  a  sermon  on  the  subject  of  the 

85 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

modern  idea  of  admiring  the  great  for  crushing 
the  small,  and  sketched  out  some  notes  for  it 
which  he  thought  solved  the  problem  of  flaying 
the  local  abuse  without  mentioning  it  by  name. 
They  had  lain  on  his  desk  now  for  ten  days  or 
more,  and  on  only  the  previous  Friday  he  had 
speculated  upon  using  them  that  coming  Sunday. 

On  this  bright  and  cheerful  Tuesday  morning 
he  walked  with  a  blithe  step  unhesitatingly  down 
the  main  street  to  "Thurston's,"  and  entered 
without  any  show  of  repugnance  the  door  next  to 
the  window  wherein,  flanked  by  dangling  banjos 
and  key-bugles  built  in  pyramids,  was  displayed 
the  sign,  "  Pianos  on  the  Instalment  Plan." 

He  was  recognized  by  some  responsible  persons, 
and  treated  with  distinguished  deference.  They 
were  charmed  with  the  intelligence  that  he  desired 
a  piano,  and  fascinated  by  his  wish  to  pay  for  it 
only  a  little  at  a  time.  They  had  special  terms 
for  clergymen,  and  made  him  feel  as  if  these  were 
being  extended  to  him  on  a  silver  charger  by 
kneeling  admirers. 

It  was  so  easy  to  buy  things  here  that  he  was  a 
trifle  disturbed  to  find  his  flowing  course  inter 
rupted  by  his  own  entire  ignorance  as  to  what 
kind  of  piano  he  wanted.  He  looked  at  all  they 
had  in  stock,  and  heard  them  played  upon.  They 
differed  greatly  in  price,  and,  so  he  fancied,  almost 
as  much  in  tone.  It  discouraged  him  to  note, 
however,  that  several  of  those  he  thought  the 

86 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

finest  in  tone  were  among  the  very  cheapest  in  the 
lot.  Pondering  this,  and  staring  in  hopeless  puz 
zlement  from  one  to  another  of  the  big  black  shiny 
monsters,  he  suddenly  thought  of  something. 

"  I  would  rather  not  decide  for  myself,"  he 
said,  "I  know  so  little  about  it.  If  you  don't 
mind,  I  will  have  a  friend  of  mine,  a  skilled  mu 
sician,  step  in  and  make  a  selection.  I  have  so 
much  confidence  in —  in  her  judgment."  He 
added  hurriedly,  "  It  will  involve  only  a  day  or 
two's  delay." 

The  next  moment  he  was  sorry  he  had  spoken. 
What  would  they  think  when  they  saw  the  organist 
of  the  Catholic  church  come  to  pick  out  a  piano  for 
the  Methodist  parsonage?  And  how  could  he 
decorously  prefer  the  request  to  her  to  undertake 
this  task?  He  might  not  meet  her  again  for  ages, 
and  to  his  provincial  notions  writing  would  have 
seemed  out  of  the  question.  And  would  it  not  be 
disagreeable  to  have  her  know  that  he  was  buying 
a  piano  by  part  payments?  Poor  Alice's  dread 
of  the  washerwoman's  gossip  occurred  to  him,  at 
this,  and  he  smiled  in  spite  of  himself.  Then 
all  at  once  the  difficulty  vanished.  Of  course  it 
would  come  all  right  somehow.  Everything  did. 

He  was  on  firmer  ground,  buying  the  materials 
for  the  new  book,  over  on  the  stationery  side. 
His  original  intention  had  been  to  bestow  this 
patronage  upon  the  old  bookseller,  but  these 
suavely  smart  people  in  "  Thurston's  "  had  had 

8? 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  effect  of  putting  him  on  his  honor  when  they 
asked,  "Would  there  be  anything  else?"  and  he 
had  followed  them  unresistingly. 

He  indulged  to  the  full  his  whim  that  everything 
entering  into  the  construction  of  "Abraham " 
should  be  spick-and-span.  He  watched  with  his 
own  eyes  a  whole  ream  of  broad  glazed  white 
paper  being  sliced  down  by  the  cutter  into  single 
sheets,  and  thrilled  with  a  novel  ecstasy  as  he  laid 
his  hand  upon  the  spotless  bulk,  so  wooingly  did 
it  invite  him  to  begin.  He  tried  a  score  of  pens 
before  the  right  one  came  to  hand.  When  a  box 
of  these  had  been  laid  aside,  with  ink  and  pen 
holders  and  a  little  bronze  inkstand,  he  made  a 
sign  that  the  outfit  was  complete.  Or  no  —  there 
must  be  some  blotting-paper.  He  had  always 
used  those  blotting-pads  given  away  by  insurance 
companies,  —  his  congregations  never  failed  to 
contain  one  or  more  agents,  who  had  these  to 
bestow  by  the  armful,  —  but  the  book  deserved  a 
virgin  blotter. 

Theron  stood  by  while  all  these  things  were 
being  tied  up  together  in  a  parcel.  The  sugges 
tion  that  they  should  be  sent  almost  hurt  him. 
Oh,  no,  he  would  carry  them  home  himself.  So 
strongly  did  they  appeal  to  -his  sanguine  imagi 
nation  that  he  could  not  forbear  hinting  to  the 
man  who  had  shown  him  the  pianos  and  was  now 
accompanying  him  to  the  door  that  this  package 
under  his  arm  represented  potentially  the  price 

88 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

of  the  piano  he  was  going  to  have.  He  did  it  in 
a  roundabout  way,  with  one  of  his  droll,  hesitating 
smiles.  The  man  did  not  understand  at  all,  and 
Theron  had  not  the  temerity  to  repeat  the  remark. 
He  strode  home  with  the  precious  bundle  as  fast 
as  he  could. 

"  I  thought  it  best,  after  all,  not  to  commit 
myself  to  a  selection,"  he  explained  about  the 
piano  at  dinner-time.  "  In  such  a  matter  as  this, 
the  opinion  of  an  expert  is  everything.  I  am 
going  to  have  one  of  the  principal  musicians  of 
the  town  go  and  try  them  all,  and  tell  me  which 
we  ought  to  have." 

"  And  while  he 's  about  it,"  said  Alice,  "  you 
might  ask  him  to  make  a  little  list  of  some  of  the 
new  music.  I  Ve  got  way  behind  the  times,  being 
without  a  piano  so  long.  Tell  him  not  any  very 
difficult  pieces,  you  know." 

"Yes,  I  know,"  put  in  Theron,  almost  hastily, 
and  began  talking  of  other  things.  His  conver 
sation  was  of  the  most  rambling  and  desultory 
sort,  because  all  the  while  the  two  lobes  of  his 
brain,  as  it  were,  kept  up  a  dispute  as  to  whether 
Alice  ought  to  have  been  told  that  this  "  principal 
musician  "  was  of  her  own  sex.  It  would  certainly 
have  been  better,  at  the  outset,  he  decided ;  but 
to  mention  it  now  would  be  to  invest  the  fact  with 
undue  importance.  Yes,  that  was  quite  clear; 
only  the  clearer  it  became,  from  one  point  of  view, 
the  shadier  it  waxed  from  the  other.  The  prob- 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

lem  really  disturbed  the  young  minister's  mind 
throughout  the  meal,  and  his  abstraction  became 
so  marked  at  last  that  his  wife  commented  upon  it. 

"A  penny  for  your  thoughts!"  she  said,  with 
cheerful  briskness.  This  ancient  formula  of  the 
farm-land  had  always  rather  jarred  on  Theron. 
It  presented  itself  now  to  his  mind  as  a  peculiarly 
aggravating  banality. 

"  I  am  going  to  begin  my  book  this  afternoon," 
he  remarked  impressively.  "  There  is  a  great 
deal  to  think  about." 

It  turned  out  that  there  was  even  more  to  think 
about  than  he  had  imagined.  After  hours  of  soli 
tary  musing  at  his  desk,  or  of  pacing  up  and  down 
before  his  open  book-shelves,  Theron  found  the 
first  shadows  of  a  May-day  twilight  beginning  to 
fall  upon  that  beautiful  pile  of  white  paper,  still 
unstained  by  ink.  He  saw  the  book  he  wanted 
to  write  before  him,  in  his  mental  vision,  much 
more  distinctly  than  ever,  but  the  idea  of  begin 
ning  it  impetuously,  and  hurling  it  off  hot  and 
glowing  week  by  week,  had  faded  away  like  a 
dream. 

This  long  afternoon,  spent  face  to  face  with  a  pro 
ject  born  of  his  own  brain  but  yesterday,  yet  already 
so  much  bigger  than  himself,  was  really  a  most  fruitful 
time  for  the  young  clergyman.  The  lessons  which 
cut  most  deeply  into  our  consciousness  are  those 
we  learn  from  our  children.  Theron,  in  this  first 
day's  contact  with  the  offspring  of  his  fancy,  found 

90 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

revealed  to  him  an  unsuspected  and  staggering 
truth.  It  was  that  he  was  an  extremely  ignorant 
and  rudely  untrained  young  man,  whose  preten 
sions  to  intellectual  authority  among  any  edu 
cated  people  would  be  laughed  at  with  deserved 
contempt. 

Strangely  enough,  after  he  had  weathered  the 
first  shock,  this  discovery  did  not  dismay  Theron 
Ware.  The  very  completeness  of  the  conviction 
it  carried  with  it,  saturated  his  mind  with  a  feeling 
as  if  the  fact  had  really  been  known  to  him  all 
along.  And  there  came,  too,  after  a  little,  an  almost 
pleasurable  sense  of  the  importance  of  the  revela 
tion.  He  had  been  merely  drifting  in  fatuous  and 
conceited  blindness.  Now  all  at  once  his  eyes 
were  open ;  he  knew  what  he  had  to  do.  Igno 
rance  was  a  thing  to  be  remedied,  and  he  would 
forthwith  bend  all  his  energies  to  cultivating  his 
mind  till  it  should  blossom  like  a  garden.  In  this 
mood,  Theron  mentally  measured  himself  against 
the  more  conspicuous  of  his  colleagues  in  the  Con 
ference.  They  also  were  ignorant,  clownishly  igno 
rant  :  the  difference  was  that  they  were  doomed 
by  native  incapacity  to  go  on  all  their  lives  with 
out  ever  finding  it  out.  It  was  obvious  to  him  that 
his  case  was  better.  There  was  bright  promise  in 
the  very  fact  that  he  had  discovered  his  short 
comings. 

He  had  begun  the  afternoon  by  taking  down 
from  their  places  the  various  works  in  his  meagre 

91 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

library  which  bore  more  or  less  relation  to  the  task 
in  hand.  The  threescore  books  which  constituted 
his  printed  possessions  were  almost  wholly  from 
the  press  of  the  Book  Concern ;  the  few  exceptions 
were  volumes  which,  though  published  elsewhere, 
had  come  to  him  through  that  giant  circulating 
agency  of  the  General  Conference,  and  wore  the 
stamp  of  its  approval.  Perhaps  it  was  the  sight  of 
these  half-filled  shelves  which  started  this  day's 
great  revolution  in  Theron's  opinions  of  himself. 
He  had  never  thought  much  before  about  owning 
books.  He  had  been  too  poor  to  buy  many,  and 
the  conditions  of  canvassing  about  among  one's 
parishioners  which  the  thrifty  Book  Concern  im 
poses  upon  those  who  would  have  without  buying, 
had  always  repelled  him.  Now,  suddenly,  as  he 
moved  along  the  two  shelves,  he  felt  ashamed  at 
their  beggarly  showing. 

"The  Land  and  the  Book,"  in  three  portly 
volumes,  was  the  most  pretentious  of  the  aids 
which  he  finally  culled  from  his  collection.  Beside 
it  he  laid  out  "Bible  Lands,"  "  Rivers  and  Lakes 
of  Scripture,"  "  Bible  Manners  and  Customs,"  the 
"  Genesis  and  Exodus "  volume  of  Whedon's 
Commentary,  some  old  numbers  of  the  "  Methodist 
Quarterly  Review,"  and  a  copy  of  "Josephus" 
which  had  belonged  to  his  grandmother,  and  had 
seen  him  through  many  a  weary  Sunday  afternoon 
in  boyhood.  He  glanced  casually  through  these, 
one  by  one,  as  he  took  them  down,  and  began  to 

92 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

fear  that  they  were  not  going  to  be  of  so  much 
use  as  he  had  thought.  Then,  seating  himself,  he 
read  carefully  through  the  thirteen  chapters  of 
Genesis  which  chronicle  the  story  of  the  founder 
of  Israel. 

Of  course  he  had  known  this  story  from  his 
earliest  years.  In  almost  every  chapter  he  came 
now  upon  a  phrase  or  an  incident  which  had 
served  him  as  the  basis  for  a  sermon.  He  had 
preached  about  Hagar  in  the  wilderness,  about 
Lot's  wife,  about  the  visit  of  the  angels,  about  the 
intended  sacrifice  of  Isaac,  about  a  dozen  other 
things  suggested  by  the  ancient  narrative.  Some 
how  this  time  it  all  seemed  different  to  him.  The 
people  he  read  about  were  altered  to  his  vision. 
Heretofore  a  poetic  light  had  shone  about  them, 
where  indeed  they  had  not  glowed  in  a  halo  of 
sanctincation.  Now,  by  some  chance,  this  light 
was  gone,  and  he  saw  them  instead  as  untutored 
and  unwashed  barbarians,  rilled  with  animal  lusts 
and  ferocities,  struggling  by  violence  and  foul 
chicanery  to  secure  a  foothold  in  a  country  which 
did  not  belong  to  them,  —  all  rude  tramps  and 
robbers  of  the  uncivilized  plain. 

The  apparent  fact  that  x-\bram  was  a  Chaldean 
struck  him  with  peculiar  force.  How  was  it,  he 
wondered,  that  this  had  never  occurred  to  him 
before  ?  Examining  himself,  he  found  that  he  had 
supposed  vaguely  that  there  had  been  Jews  from 
the  beginning,  or  at  least,  say,  from  the  flood. 

93 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

But,  no,  Abram  was  introduced  simply  as  a  citizen 
of  the  Chaldean  town  of  Ur,  and  there  was  no 
hint  of  any  difference  in  race  between  him  and 
his  neighbors.  It  was  specially  mentioned  that 
his  brother,  Lot's  father,  died  in  Ur,  the  city  of  his 
nativity.  Evidently  the  family  belonged  there, 
and  were  Chaldeans  like  the  rest. 

I  do  not  cite  this  as  at  all  a  striking  discovery, 
but  it  did  have  a  curious  effect  upon  Theron  Ware. 
Up  to  that  very  afternoon,  his  notion  of  the  kind 
of  book  he  wanted  to  write  had  been  founded 
upon  a  popular  book  called  "  Ruth  the  Moabitess," 
written  by  a  clergyman  he  knew  very  well,  the 
Rev.  E.  Ray  Mifflin.  This  model  performance 
troubled  itself  not  at  all  with  difficult  points,  but 
went  swimmingly  along  through  scented  summer 
seas  of  pretty  rhetoric,  teaching  nothing,  it  is  true, 
but  pleasing  a  good  deal  and  selling  like  hot  cakes. 
Now,  all  at  once  Theron  felt  that  he  hated  that  sort 
of  book.  His  work  should  be  of  a  vastly  different 
order.  He  might  fairly  assume,  he  thought,  that 
if  the  fact  that  Abram  was  a  Chaldean  was  new  to 
him,  it  would  fall  upon  the  world  in  general  as  a 
novelty.  Very  well,  then,  there  was  his  chance. 
He  would  write  a  learned  book,  showing  who  the 
Chaldeans  were,  and  how  their  manners  and 
beliefs  differed  from,  and  influenced  — 

It  was  at  this  psychological  instant  that  the 
wave  of  self-condemnation  suddenly  burst  upon 
and  submerged  the  young  clergyman.  It  passed 

94 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

again,  leaving  him  staring  fixedly  at  the  pile  of 
books  he  had  taken  down  from  the  shelves,  and 
gasping  a  little,  as  if  for  breath.  Then  the  humor 
ous  side  of  the  thing,  perversely  enough,  appealed 
to  him,  and  he  grinned  feebly  to  himself  at  the 
joke  of  his  having  imagined  that  he  could  write 
learnedly  about  the  Chaldeans,  or  anything  else. 
But,  no,  it  should  n't  remain  a  joke  !  His  long 
mobile  face  grew  serious  under  the  new  resolve. 
He  would  learn  what  there  was  to  be  learned 
about  the  Chaldeans.  He  rose  and  walked  up 
and  down  the  room,  gathering  fresh  strength  of 
purpose  as  this  inviting  field  of  research  spread 
out  its  vistas  before  him.  Perhaps  —  yes,  he 
would  incidentally  explore  the  mysteries  of  the 
Moabitic  past  as  well,  and  thus  put  the  Rev.  E. 
Ray  Mifflin  to  confusion  on  his  own  subject. 
That  would  in  itself  be  a  useful  thing,  because 
Mifflin  wore  kid  gloves  at  the  Conference,  and 
affected  an  intolerable  superiority  of  dress  and 
demeanor,  and  there  would  be  general  satisfaction 
among  the  plainer  and  worthier  brethren  at  seeing 
him  taken  down  a  peg. 

Now  for  the  first  time  there  rose  distinctly  in 
Theron's  mind  that  casual  allusion  which  Father 
Forbes  had  made  to  the  Turanians.  He  recalled, 
too,  his  momentary  feeling  of  mortification  at  not 
knowing  who  the  Turanians  were,  at  the  time. 
Possibly,  if  he  had  probed  this  matter  more 
deeply,  now  as  he  walked  and  pondered  in  the 

95 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

little  living-room,  he  might  have  traced  the  whole 
of  the  afternoon's  mental  experiences  to  that 
chance  remark  of  the  Romish  priest.  But  this 
speculation  did  not  detain  him.  He  mused  in 
stead  upon  the  splendid  library  Father  Forbes 
must  have. 

"  Well,  how  does  the  book  come  on  ?  Have 
you  got  to  'my  lady  Keturah '  yet?'" 

It  was  Alice  who  spoke,  opening  the  door  from 
the  kitchen,  and  putting  in  her  head  with  a  pre 
tence  of  great  and  solemn  caution,  but  with  a  cor 
recting  twinkle  in  her  eyes. 

"  I  have  n't  got  to  anybody  yet,"  answered 
Theron,  absently.  "  These  big  things  must  be 
approached  slowly." 

"  Come  out  to  supper,  then,  while  the  beans  are 
hot,"  said  Alice. 

The  young  minister  sat  through  this  other  meal, 
again  in  deep  abstraction.  His  wife  pursued  her 
little  pleasantry  about  Keturah,  the  second  wife, 
urging  him  with  mock  gravity  to  scold  her  roundly 
for  daring  to  usurp  Sarah's  place,  but  Theron 
scarcely  heard  her,  and  said  next  to  nothing.  He 
ate  sparingly,  and  fidgeted  in  his  seat,  waiting  with 
obvious  impatience  for  the  finish  of  the  meal.  At 
last  he  rose  abruptly. 

"  I  Ve  got  a  call  to  make,  —  something  with 
reference  to  the  book,"  he  said.  "  I  '11  run  out 
now,  I  think,  before  it  gets  dark." 

He  put  on  his  hat,  and  strode  out  of  the  house 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

as  if  his  errand  was  of  the  utmost  urgency.  Once 
upon  the  street,  however,  his  pace  slackened. 
There  was  still  a  good  deal  of  daylight  outside, 
and  he  loitered  aimlessly  about,  walking  with  bowed 
head  and  hands  clasped  behind  him,  until  dusk 
fell.  Then  he  squared  his  shoulders,  and  started 
straight  as  the  crow  flies  toward  the  residence  of 
Father  Forbes. 


97 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE  new  Catholic  church  was  the  largest  and 
most  imposing  public  building  in  Octavius.  Even 
in  its  unfinished  condition,  with  a  bald  roofing  of 
weather-beaten  boards  marking  on  the  stunted 
tower  the  place  where  a  spire  was  to  begin  .later 
on,  it  dwarfed  every  other  edifice  of  the  sort  in 
the  town,  just  as  it  put  them  all  to  shame  in  the 
matter  of  the  throngs  it  drew,  rain  or  shine,  to  its 
services. 

These  facts  had  not  heretofore  been  a  source  of 
satisfaction  to  the  Rev.  Theron  Ware.  He  had 
even  alluded  to  the  subject  in  terms  which  gave  his 
wife  the  impression  that  he  actively  deplored  the 
strength  and  size  of  the  Catholic  denomination  in 
this  new  home  of  theirs,  and  was  troubled  in  his 
mind  about  Rome  generally.  But  this  evening  he 
walked  along  the  extended  side  of  the  big  struc 
ture,  which  occupied  nearly  half  the  block,  and 
then,  turning  the  corner,  passed  in  review  its  wide- 
doored,  looming  front,  without  any  hostile  emo 
tions  whatever.  In  the  gathering  dusk  it  seemed 
more  massive  than  ever  before,  but  he  found  him 
self  only  passively  considering  the  odd  statement 
he  had  heard  that  all  Catholic  Church  property 

98 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

was  deeded  absolutely  in  the  name  of  the  Bishop 
of  the  diocese. 

Only  a  narrow  passage-way  separated  the  church 
from  the  pastorate,  a  fine  new  brick  residence  stand 
ing  flush  upon  the  street.  Theron  mounted  the 
steps,  and  looked  about  for  a  bell-pull.  Search 
revealed  instead  a  little  ivory  button  set  in  a  ring 
of  metal  work.  He  picked  at  this  for  a  time  with 
his  finger-nail,  before  he  made  out  the  injunction, 
printed  across  it,  to  push.  Of  course  !  how  stupid 
of  him  !  This  was  one  of  those  electric  bells  he 
had  heard  so  much  of,  but  which  had  not  as  yet 
made  their  way  to  the  class  of  homes  he  knew. 
For  custodians  of  a  mediaeval  superstition  and 
fanaticism,  the  Catholic  clergy  seemed  very  much 
up  to  date.  This  bell  made  him  feel  rather  more 
a  countryman  than  ever. 

The  door  was  opened  by  a  tall  gaunt  woman, 
who  stood  in  black  relief  against  the  radiance  of 
the  hall-way  while  Theron,  choosing  his  words 
with  some  diffidence,  asked  if  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Forbes  was  in. 

"  He  is,"  came  the  hush-voiced  answer.  "  He  's 
at  dinner,  though." 

It  took  the  young  minister  a  second  or  two  to 
bring  into  association  in  his  mind  this  evening 
hour  and  this  midday  meal.  Then  he  began  to 
say  that  he  would  call  again,  —  it  was  nothing 
special,  —  but  the  woman  suddenly  cut  him  short 
by  throwing  the  door  wide  open. 

99 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"It's  Mr.  Ware,  is  it  not?"  she  asked,  in  a 
greatly  altered  tone.  "  Sure,  he  'd  not  have  you 
go  away.  Come  inside  —  do,  sir  !  —  I  '11  tell 
him." 

Theron,  with  a  dumb  show  of  reluctance,  crossed 
the  threshold.  He  noted  now  that  the  woman, 
who  had  bustled  down  the  hall  on  her  errand,  was 
gray-haired  and  incredibly  ugly,  with  a  dark  sour 
face,  glowering  black  eyes,  and  a  twisted  mouth. 
Then  he  saw  that  he  was  not  alone  in  the  hall- way. 
Three  men  and  two  women,  all  poorly  clad  and 
obviously  working  people,  were  seated  in  meek 
silence  on  a  bench  beyond  the  hat-rack.  They 
glanced  up  at  him  for  an  instant,  then  resumed 
their  patient  study  of  the  linoleum  pattern  on  the 
floor  at  their  feet. 

"  And  will  you  kindly  step  in,  sir?  "  the  elderly 
Gorgon  had  returned  to  ask.  She  led  Mr.  Ware 
along  the  hall-way  to  a  door  near  the  end,  and 
opened  it  for  him  to  pass  before  her. 

He  entered  a  room  in  which  for  the  moment  he 
could  see  nothing  but  a  central  glare  of  dazzling 
light  beating  down  from  a  great  shaded  lamp  upon 
a  circular  patch  of  white  table  linen.  Inside  this 
ring  of  illumination  points  of  fire  sparkled  from 
silver  and  porcelain,  and  two  bars  of  burning 
crimson  tracked  across  the  cloth  in  reflection  from 
tall  glasses  filled  with  wine.  The  rest  of  the  room 
was  vague  darkness,  but  the  gloom  seemed  satu 
rated  with  novel  aromatic  odors,  the  appetizing 

100 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

scent  of  which  bore  clear  relation  to  what  Theron's 
blinking  eyes  rested  upon. 

He  was  able  now  to  discern  two  figures  at  the 
table,  outside  the  glowing  circle  of  the  lamp. 
They  had  both  risen,  and  one  came  toward  him 
with  cordial  celerity,  holding  out  a  white  plump 
hand  in  greeting.  He  took  this  proffered  hand 
rather  limply,  not  wholly  sure  in  the  half-light  that 
this  really  was  Father  Forbes,  and  began  once 
more  that  everlasting  apology  to  which  he  seemed 
doomed  in  the  presence  of  the  priest.  It  was 
broken  abruptly  off  by  the  other's  protesting 
laughter. 

"  My  dear  Mr.  Ware,  I  beg  of  you,"  the  priest 
urged,  chuckling  with  hospitable  mirth,  "don't, 
don't  apologize  !  I  give  you  my  word,  nothing  in 
the  world  could  have  pleased  us  better  than  your 
joining  us  here  to-night.  It  was  quite  dramatic, 
your  coming  in  as  you  did.  We  were  speaking  of 
you  at  that  very  moment.  Oh,  I  forgot  —  let  me 
make  you  acquainted  with  my  friend  —  my  very 
particular  friend,  Dr.  Ledsmar.  Let  me  take 
your  hat;  pray  draw  up  a  chair.  Maggie  will 
have  a  place  laid  for  you  in  a  minute." 

"  Oh,  I  assure  you  —  I  could  n't  think  of  it  — 
I  've  just  eaten  my —  my —  dinner,"  expostulated 
Theron.  He  murmured  more  inarticulate  remon 
strances  a  moment  later,  when  the  grim  old 
domestic  appeared  with  plates,  serviette,  and  table 
ware  for  his  use,  but  she  went  on  spreading  them 

101 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

before  him  as  if  she  heard  nothing.  Thus  com 
mitted  against  a  decent  show  of  resistance,  the 
young  minister  did  eat  a  little  here  and  there  of 
what  was  set  before  him,  and  was  human  enough 
to  regret  frankly  that  he  could  not  eat  more.  It 
seemed  to  him  very  remarkable  cookery,  trans 
figuring  so  simple  a  thing  as  a  steak,  for  example, 
quite  out  of  recognition,  and  investing  the  humble 
potato  with  a  charm  he  had  never  dreamed  of. 
He  wondered  from  time  to  time  if  it  would  be 
polite  to  ask  how  the  potatoes  were  cooked,  so 
that  he  might  tell  Alice. 

The  conversation  at  the  table  was  not  continu 
ous,  or  even  enlivened.  After  the  lapses  into 
silence  became  marked,  Theron  began  to  suspect 
that  his  refusal  to  drink  wine  had  annoyed  them,  — 
the  more  so  as  he  had  drenched  a  large  section  of 
table-cloth  in  his  efforts  to  manipulate  a  siphon 
instead.  He  was  greatly  relieved,  therefore,  when 
Father  Forbes  explained  in  an  incidental  way  that 
Dr.  Ledsmar  and  he  customarily  ate  their  meals 
almost  without  a  word. 

"  It 's  a  philosophic  fad  of  his,"  the  priest  went 
on  smilingly,  "  and  I  have  fallen  in  with  it  for  the 
sake  of  a  quiet  life ;  so  that  when  we  do  have 
company,  —  that  is  to  say,  once  in  a  blue  moon,  — 
we  display  no  manners  to  speak  of." 

"  I  had  always  supposed  —  that  is,  I  Ve  always 
heard  —  that  it  was  more  healthful  to  talk  at 
meals,"  said  Theron.  "  Of  course  —  what  I  mean 

IO2 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

is  —  I  took  it  for  granted  all  physicians  thought 
so." 

Dr.  Ledsmar  laughed.  "That  depends  so 
much  upon  the  quality  of  the  meals  ! "  he  re 
marked,  holding  his  glass  up  to  the  light. 

He  seemed  a  man  of  middle  age  and  an  equable 
disposition.  Theron,  stealing  stray  glances  at  him 
around  the  lampshade,  saw  most  distinctly  of  all  a 
broad,  impressive  dome  of  skull,  which,  though 
obviously  the  result  of  baldness,  gave  the  effect  of 
quite  belonging  to  the  face.  There  were  gold- 
rimmed  spectacles,  through  which  shone  now  and 
again  the  vivid  sparkle  of  sharp,  alert  eyes,  and 
there  was  a  nose  of  some  sort  not  easy  to  classify, 
at  once  long  and  thick.  The  rest  was  thin  hair 
and  short  round  beard,  mouse-colored  where  the 
light  caught  them,  but  losing  their  outlines  in  the 
shadows  of  the  background.  Theron  had  not 
heard  of  him  among  the  physicians  of  Octavius. 
He  wondered  if  he  might  not  be  a  doctor  of 
something  else  than  medicine,  and  decided  upon 
venturing  the  question. 

"  Oh,  yes,  it  is  medicine,"  replied  Ledsmar.  "  I 
am  a  doctor  three  or  four  times  over,  so  far  as 
parchments  can  make  one.  In  some  other  re 
spects,  though,  I  should  think  I  am  probably  less  of 
a  doctor  than  anybody  else  now  living.  I  have  n't 
practised  —  that  is,  regularly  —  for  many  years, 
and  I  take  no  interest  whatever  in  keeping  abreast 
of  what  the  profession  regards  as  its  progress.  I 

103 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

know  nothing  beyond  what  was  being  taught  in 
the  sixties,  and  that  I  am  glad  to  say  I  have 
mostly  forgotten." 

"Dear  me!"  said  Theron.  "I  had  always 
supposed  that  Science  was  the  most  engrossing  of 
pursuits,  —  that  once  a  man  took  it  up  he  never 
left  it." 

"  But  that  would  imply  a  connection  between 
Science  and  Medicine  !  "  commented  the  doctor. 
"  My  dear  sir,  they  are  not  even  on  speaking 
terms." 

"  Shall  we  go  upstairs?  "  put  in  the  priest,  rising 
from  his  chair.  "  It  will  be  more  comfortable  to 
have  our  coffee  there,  —  unless  indeed,  Mr.  Ware, 
tobacco  is  unpleasant  to  you?  " 

"  Oh,  my,  no  !  "  the  young  minister  exclaimed, 
eager  to  free  himself  from  the  suggestion  of  being 
a  kill-joy.  "  I  don't  smoke  myself  ;  but  I  am 
very  fond  of  the  odor,  I  assure  you." 

Father  Forbes  led  the  way  out.  It  could  be 
seen  now  that  he  wore  a  long  house-gown  of  black 
silk,  skilfully  moulded  to  his  erect,  shapely,  and 
rounded  form.  Though  he  carried  this  with  the 
natural  grace  of  a  proud  and  beautiful  belle,  there 
was  no  hint  of  the  feminine  in  his  bearing,  or  in 
the  contour  of  his  pale,  firm-set,  handsome  face. 
As  he  moved  through  the  hall -way,  the  five  people 
whom  Theron  had  seen  waiting  rose  from  their 
bench,  and  two  of  the  women  began  in  humble 
murmurs,  "  If  you  please,  Father,"  and  "  Good- 

104 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

evening  to  your  Riverence  ;  "  but  the  priest  merely 
nodded  and  passed  on  up  the  staircase,  followed 
by  his  guests.  The  people  sat  down  on  their 
bench  again. 

A  few  minutes  later,  reclining  at  his  ease  in  a 
huge  low  chair,  and  feeling  himself  unaccountably 
at  home  in  the  most  luxuriously  appointed  and 
delightful  little  room  he  had  ever  seen,  the  Rev. 
Theron  Ware  sipped  his  unaccustomed  coffee  and 
embarked  upon  an  explanation  of  his  errand. 
Somehow  the  very  profusion  of  scholarly  symbols 
about  him  —  the  great  dark  rows  of  encased  and 
crowded  book-shelves  rising  to  the  ceiling,  the 
classical  engravings  upon  the  wall,  the  revolving 
book-case,  the  reading-stand,  the  mass  of  littered 
magazines,  reviews,  and  papers  at  either  end  of 
the  costly  and  elaborate  writing-desk  —  seemed  to 
make  it  the  easier  for  him  to  explain  without  re 
proach  that  he  needed  information  about  Abram. 
He  told  them  quite  in  detail  the  story  of  his  book. 

The  two  others  sat  watching  him  through  a  faint 
haze  of  scented  smoke,  with  polite  encouragement 
on  their  faces.  Father  Forbes  took  the  added 
trouble  to  nod  understandingly  at  the  various 
points  of  the  narrative,  and  when  it  was  finished 
gave  one  of  his  little  approving  chuckles. 

"This  skirts  very  closely  upon  sorcery,"  he  said 
smilingly.  "Do  you  know,  there  is  perhaps  not 
another  man  in  the  country  who  knows  Assyriology 
so  thoroughly  as  our  friend  here,  Dr.  Ledsmar." 

I05 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  That 's  putting  it  too  strong,"  remarked  the 
doctor.  "  I  only  follow  at  a  distance,  —  a  year  or 
two  behind.  But  I  daresay  I  can  help  you.  You 
are  quite  welcome  to  anything  I  have  :  my  books 
cover  the  ground  pretty  well  up  to  last  year. 
Delitzsch  is  very  interesting ;  but  Baudissin's  '  Stu- 
dien  zur  Semitischen  Religionsgeschichte  '  would 
come  closer  to  what  you  need.  There  are  several 
other  important  Germans,  —  Schrader,  Bunsen, 
Duncker,  Hommel,  and  so  on." 

"  Unluckily  I  —  I  don't  read  German  readily," 
Theron  explained  with  diffidence. 

"  That 's  a  pity,"  said  the  doctor,  "  because 
they  do  the  best  work,  —  not  only  in  this  field,  but 
in  most  others.  And  they  do  so  much  that  the 
mass  defies  translation.  Well,  the  best  thing  out 
side  of  German  of  course  is  Sayce.  I  daresay  you 
know  him,  though." 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Ware  shook  his  head  mournfully. 
"  I  don't  seem  to  know  any  one,"  he  murmured. 

The  others  exchanged  glances. 

"  But  if  I  may  ask,  Mr.  Ware,"  pursued  the 
doctor,  regarding  their  guest  with  interest  through 
his  spectacles,  "  why  do  you  specially  hit  upon 
Abraham  ?  He  is  full  of  difficulties,  —  enough, 
just  now,  at  any  rate,  to  warn  off  the  bravest 
scholar.  Why  not  take  something  easier?  " 

Theron  had  recovered  something  of  his  confi 
dence.  "  Oh,  no,"  he  said,  "  that  is  just  what  at 
tracts  me  to  Abraham.  I  like  the  complexities 

106 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  contradictions  in  his  character.  Take  for 
instance  all  that  strange  and  picturesque  episode 
of  Hagar :  see  the  splendid  contrast  between  the 
craft  and  commercial  guile  of  his  dealings  in  Egypt 
and  with  Abimelech,  and  the  simple,  straightfor 
ward  godliness  of  his  later  years.  No,  all  those 
difficulties  only  attract  me.  Do  you  happen  to 
know  —  of  course  you  would  know  —  do  those 
German  books,  or  the  others,  give  anywhere  any 
additional  details  of  the  man  himself  and  his  say 
ings  and  doings,  —  little  things  which  help,  you 
know,  to  round  out  one's  conception  of  the  in 
dividual?" 

Again  the  priest  and  the  doctor  stole  a  furtive 
glance  across  the  young  minister's  head.  It  was 
Father  Forbes  who  replied. 

"  I  fear  that  you  are  taking  our  friend  Abraham 
too  literally,  Mr.  Ware,"  he  said,  in  that  gentle 
semblance  of  paternal  tones  which  seemed  to  go 
so  well  with  his  gown.  "  Modern  research,  you 
know,  quite  wipes  him  out  of  existence  as  an  indi 
vidual.  The  word  '  Abram '  is  merely  an  eponym,  — 
it  means  *  exalted  father.'  Practically  all  the  names 
in  the  Genesis  chronologies  are  what  we  call  epony 
mous.  Abram  is  not  a  person  at  all :  he  is  a 
tribe,  a  sept,  a  clan.  In  the  same  way,  Shem  is 
not  intended  for  a  man ;  it  is  the  name  of  a  great 
division  of  the  human  race.  Heber  is  simply  the 
throwing  back  into  allegorical  substance,  so  to 
speak,  of  the  Hebrews;  Heth  of  the  Hittites; 
Asshur  of  Assyria."  107 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  But  this  is  something  very  new,  this  theory, 
is  n't  it?  "  queried  Theron. 

The  priest  smiled  and  shook  his  head.  "  Bless 
you,  no !  My  dear  sir,  there  is  nothing  new. 
Epicurus  and  Lucretius  outlined  the  whole  Dar 
winian  theory  more  than  two  thousand  years  ago. 
As  for  this  eponym  thing,  why  Saint  Augustine 
called  attention  to  it  fifteen  hundred  years  ago.  In 
his  '  De  Civitate  Dei,'  he  expressly  says  of  these 
genealogical  names,  ' gentes  non  homines;'1  that 
is,  '  peoples,  not  persons.'  It  was  as  obvious  to 
him  —  as  much  a  commonplace  of  knowledge  — 
as  it  was  to  Ezekiel  eight  hundred  years  before 
him." 

"  It  seems  passing  strange  that  we  should  not 
know  it  now,  then,"  commented  Theron ;  "  I 
mean,  that  everybody  should  n't  know  it." 

Father  Forbes  gave  a  little  purring  chuckle. 
"Ah,  there  we  get  upon  contentious  ground,"  he 
remarked.  "  Why  should  '  everybody '  be  sup 
posed  to  know  anything  at  all?  What  business  is 
it  of  '  everybody's  '  to  know  things?  The  earth 
was  just  as  round  in  the  days  when  people  sup 
posed  it  to  be  flat,  as  it  is  now.  So  the  truth  re 
mains  always  the  truth,  even  though  you  give  a 
charter  to  ten  hundred  thousand  separate  num 
skulls  to  examine  it  by  the  light  of  their  private 
judgment,  and  report  that  it  is  as  many  different 
varieties  of  something  else.  But  of  course  that 
whole  question  of  private  judgment  versus  author- 

108 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ity  is  No-Man's-Land  for  us.  We  were  speaking 
of  eponyms." 

"Yes,"  said  Theron;  "it  is  very  interesting." 
"  There  is  a  curious  phase  of  the  subject  which 
has  n't  been  worked  out  much,"  continued  the 
priest.  "  Probably  the  Germans  will  get  at  that 
too,  sometime.  They  are  doing  the  best  Irish 
work  in  other  fields,  as  it  is.  I  spoke  of  Heber 
and  Heth,  in  Genesis,  as  meaning  the  Hebrews 
and  the  Hittites.  Now  my  own  people,  the  Irish, 
have  far  more  ancient  legends  and  traditions  than 
any  other  nation  west  of  Athens ;  and  you  find  in 
their  myth  of  the  Milesian  invasion  and  conquest 
two  principal  leaders  called  Heber  and  Ith,  or 
Heth.  That  is  supposed  to  be  comparatively 
modern,  —  about  the  time  of  Solomon's  Temple. 
But  these  independent  Irish  myths  go  back  to  the 
fall  of  the  Tower  of  Babel,  and  they  have  there  an 
ancestor,  grandson  of  Japhet,  named  Fenius  Farsa, 
and  they  ascribe  to  him  the  invention  of  the  alpha 
bet.  They  took  their  ancient  name  of  Feine,  the 
modern  Fenian,  from  him.  Oddly  enough,  that 
is  the  name  which  the  Romans  knew  the  Phceni- 

i 

cians  by,  and  to  them  also  is  ascribed  the  inven 
tion  of  the  alphabet.  The  Irish  have  a  holy  salmon 
of  knowledge,  just  like  the  Chaldean  man-fish. 
The  Druids'  tree-worship  is  identical  with  that  of 
the  Chaldeans,  —  those  pagan  groves,  you  know, 
which  the  Jews  were  always  being  punished  for 
building.  You  see,  there  is  nothing  new.  Every- 

109 


thing  is  built  on  the  ruins  of  something  else.  Just 
as  the  material  earth  is  made  up  of  countless  bil 
lions  of  dead  men's  bones,  so  the  mental  world  is 
all  alive  with  the  ghosts  of  dead  men's  thoughts 
and  beliefs,  the  wraiths  of  dead  races'  faiths  and 
imaginings." 

Father  Forbes  paused,  then  added  with  a  twinkle 
in  his  eye  :  "  That  peroration  is  from  an  old  ser 
mon  of  mine,  in  the  days  when  I  used  to  preach* 
I  remember  rather  liking  it,  at  the  time." 

"But  you  still  preach?"  asked  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Ware,  with  lifted  brows. 

"  No  !  no  more  !  I  only  talk  now  and  again," 
answered  the  priest,  with  what  seemed  a  suggestion 
of  curtness.  He  made  haste  to  take  the  con 
versation  back  again.  "  The  names  of  these  dead- 
and-gone  things  are  singularly  pertinacious,  though. 
They  survive  indefinitely.  Take  the  modern  name 
Marmaduke,  for  example.  It  strikes  one  as  pecu 
liarly  modern,  up-to-date,  does  n't  it  ?  Well,  it  is 
the  oldest  name  on  earth,  —  thousands  of  years 
older  than  Adam.  It  is  the  ancient  Chaldean 
Meridug,  or  Merodach.  He  was  the  young  god 
who  interceded  continually  between  the  angry, 
omnipotent  Ea,  his  father,  and  the  humble  and 
unhappy  Damkina,  or  Earth,  who  was  his  mother. 
This  is  interesting  from  another  point  of  view, 
because  this  Merodach  or  Marmaduke  is,  so  far 
as  we  can  see  now,  the  original  prototype  of  our 
*  divine  intermediary '  idea.  I  daresay,  though, 

no 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

that  if  we  could  go  back  still  other  scores  of 
centuries,  we  should  find  whole  receding  series 
of  types  of  this  Christ-myth  of  ours." 

Theron  Ware  sat  upright  at  the  fall  of  these 
words,  and  flung  a  swift,  startled  look  about  the 
room,  —  the  instinctive  glance  of  a  man  unex 
pectedly  confronted  with  peril,  and  casting  des 
perately  about  for  means  of  defence  and  escape. 
For  the  instant  his  mind  was  aflame  with  this 
vivid  impression,  —  that  he  was  among  sinister 
enemies,  at  the  mercy  of  criminals.  He  half 
rose  under  the  impelling  stress  of  this  feeling, 
with  the  sweat  standing  on  his  brow,  and  his 
jaw  dropped  in  a  scared  and  bewildered  stare. 

Then,  quite  as  suddenly,  the  sense  of  shock 
was  gone ;  and  it  was  as  if  nothing  at  all  had 
happened.  He  drew  a  long  breath,  took  another 
sip  of  his  coffee,  and  found  himself  all  at  once 
reflecting  almost  pleasurably  upon  the  charm  of 
contact  with  really  educated  people.  He  leaned 
back  in  the  big  chair  again,  and  smiled  to  show 
these  men  of  the  world  how  much  at  his  ease  he 
was.  It  required  an  effort,  he  discovered,  but  he 
made  it  bravely,  and  hoped  he  was  succeeding. 

"  It  has  n't  been  in  my  power  to  at  all  lay  hold 
of  what  the  world  keeps  on  learning  nowadays 
about  its  babyhood,"  he  said.  "  All  I  have  done 
is  to  try  to  preserve  an  open  mind,  and  to  main 
tain  my  faith  that  the  more  we  know,  the  nearer 
we  shall  approach  the  Throne." 

in 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Dr.  Ledsmar  abruptly  scuffled  his  feet  on  the 
floor,  and  took  out  his  watch.  "I'm  afraid  —  " 
he  began. 

"  No,  no  !  There  's  plenty  of  time,"  remarked 
the  priest,  with  his  soft  half- smile  and  purring 
tones.  "  You  finish  your  cigar  here  with  Mr.  Ware, 
and  excuse  me  while  I  run  down  and  get  rid  of 
the  people  in  the  hall." 

Father  Forbes  tossed  his  cigar- end  into  the 
fender.  Then  he  took  from  the  mantel  a  strange 
three-cornered  black-velvet  cap,  with  a  dangling 
silk  tassel  at  the  side,  put  it  on  his  head,  and  went 
out. 

Theron,  being  left  alone  with  the  doctor,  hardly 
knew  what  to  do  or  say.  He  took  up  a  paper  from 
the  floor  beside  him,  but  realized  that  it  would  be 
impolite  to  go  farther,  and  laid  it  on  his  knee. 
Some  trace  of  that  earlier  momentary  feeling  that 
he  was  in  hostile  hands  came  back,  and  worried 
him.  He  lifted  himself  upright  in  the  chair, 
and  then  became  conscious  that  what  really  dis 
turbed  him  was  the  fact  that  Dr.  Ledsmar  had 
turned  in  his  seat,  crossed  his  legs,  and  was 
contemplating  him  with  a  gravely  concentrated 
scrutiny  through  his  spectacles. 

This  uncomfortable  gaze  kept  itself  up  a  long 
way  beyond  the  point  of  good  manners ;  but  the 
doctor  seemed  not  to  mind  that  at  all. 


112 


CHAPTER  VIII 

WHEN  Dr.  Ledsmar  finally  spoke,  it  was  in  a 
kindlier  tone  than  the  young  minister  had  looked 
for.  "  I  had  half  a  notion  of  going  to  hear 
you  preach  the  other  evening, "he  said;  "but  at 
the  last  minute  I  backed  out.  I  daresay  I  shall 
pluck  up  the  courage,  sooner  or  later,  and  really 
go.  It  must  be  fully  twenty  years  since  I  last 
heard  a  sermon,  and  I  had  supposed  that  that 
would  suffice  for  the  rest  of  my  life.  But  they 
tell  me  that  you  are  worth  while ;  and,  for  some 
reason  or  other,  I  find  myself  curious  on  the 
subject." 

Involved  and  dubious  though  the  compliment 
might  be,  Theron  felt  himself  flushing  with  satis 
faction.  He  nodded  his  acknowledgment,  and 
changed  the  topic. 

"  I  was  surprised  to  hear  Father  Forbes  say  that 
he  did  not  preach,"  he  remarked. 

"  Why  should  he?  "asked  the  doctor,  indiffer 
ently.  "  I  suppose  he  has  n't  more  than  fifteen 
parishioners  in  a  thousand  who  would  understand 
him  if  he  did,  and  of  these  probably  twelve  would 
join  in  a  complaint  to  his  Bishop  about  the  hetero- 
8  113 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

dox  tone  of  his  sermon.  There  is  no  point  in  his 
going  to  all  that  pains,  merely  to  incur  that  risk. 
Nobody  wants  him  to  preach,  and  he  has  reached 
an  age  where  personal  vanity  no  longer  tempts  him 
to  do  so.  What  is  wanted  of  him  is  that  he  should 
be  the  paternal,  ceremonial,  authoritative  head  and 
centre  of  his  flock,  adviser,  monitor,  overseer,  elder 
brother,  friend,  patron,  seigneur,  —  whatever  you 
like,  —  everything  except  a  bore.  They  draw  the 
line  at  that.  You  see  how  diametrically  opposed 
this  Catholic  point  of  view  is  to  the  Protestant." 

"  The  difference  does  seem  extremely  curious  to 
me,"  said  Theron.  "Now,  those  people  in  the 
hall  —  " 

"Go  on,"  put  in  the  doctor,  as  the  other 
faltered  hesitatingly.  "  I  know  what  you  were 
going  to  say.  It  struck  you  as  odd  that  he 
should  let  them  wait  on  the  bench  there,  while 
he  came  up  here  to  smoke." 

Theron  smiled  faintly.  "  I  was  thinking  that 
my  —  my  parishioners  would  n't  have  taken  it  so 
quietly.  But  of  course  —  it  is  all  so  different!" 

"  As  chalk  from  cheese  !  "  said  Dr.  Ledsmar, 
lighting  a  fresh  cigar.  "  I  daresay  every  one  you 
saw  there  had  come  either  to  take  the  pledge,  or 
see  to  it  that  one  of  the  others  took  it.  That  is 
the  chief  industry  in  the  hall,  so  far  as  I  have  ob 
served.  Now  discipline  is  an  important  element 
in  the  machinery  here.  Coming  to  take  the 
pledge  implies  that  you  have  been  drunk  and  are 

114 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

now  ashamed.  Both  states  have  their  values,  but 
they  are  opposed.  Sitting  on  that  bench  tends  to 
develop  penitence  to  the  prejudice  of  alcoholism. 
But  at  no  stage  would  it  ever  occur  to  the  occu 
pant  of  the  bench  that  he  was  the  best  judge  of 
how  long  he  was  to  sit  there,  or  that  his  priest 
should  interrupt  his  dinner  or  general  personal 
routine,  in  order  to  administer  that  pledge. 
Now,  I  daresay  you  have  no  people  at  all  com 
ing  to  '  swear  off.' ' 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Ware  shook  his  head.  "  No ;  if 
a  man  with  us  got  as  bad  as  all  that,  he  wouldn't 
come  near  the  church  at  all.  He  'd  simply  drop 
out,  and  there  would  be  an  end  to  it." 

"Quite  so,"  interjected  the  doctor.  "That  is 
the  voluntary  system.  But  these  fellows  can't 
drop  out.  There  ?s  no  bottom  to  the  Catholic 
Church.  Everything  that 's  in,  stays  in.  If  you  don't 
mind  my  saying  so  —  of  course  I  view  you  all  im 
partially  from  the  outside  —  but  it  seems  logical  to 
me  that  a  church  should  exist  for  those  who  need 
its  help,  and  not  for  those  who  by  their  own  pro 
fession  are  so  good  already  that  it  is  they  who  help 
the  church.  Now,  you  turn  a  man  out  of  your 
church  who  behaves  badly :  that  must  be  on  the 
theory  that  his  remaining  in  would  injure  the 
church,  and  that  in  turn  involves  the  idea  that  it 
is  the  excellent  character  of  the  parishioners  which 
imparts  virtue  to  the  church.  The  Catholics'  con 
ception,  you  see,  is  quite  the  converse.  Such  vir- 

"5 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

tue  as  they  keep  in  stock  is  on  tap,  so  to  speak, 
here  in  the  church  itself,  and  the  parishioners 
come  and  get  some  for  themselves  according  to 
their  need  for  it.  Some  come  every  day,  some 
only  once  a  year,  some  perhaps  never  between 
their  baptism  and  their  funeral.  But  they  all  have 
a  right  here,  the  professional  burglar  every  whit  as 
much  as  the  speckless  saint.  The  only  stipulation 
is  that  they  oughtn't  to  come  under  false  pre 
tences  :  the  burglar  is  in  honor  bound  not  to  pass 
himself  off  to  his  priest  as  the  saint.  But  that  is 
merely  a  moral  obligation,  established  in  the  bur 
glar's  own  interest.  It  does  him  no  good  to  come 
unless  he  feels  that  he  is  playing  the  rules  of 
the  game,  and  one  of  these  is  confession.  If  he 
cheats  there,  he  knows  that  he  is  cheating  nobody 
but  himself,  and  might  much  better  have  stopped 
away  altogether." 

Theron  nodded  his  head  comprehendingly. 
He  had  a  great  many  views  about  the  Romanish 
rite  of  confession  which  did  not  at  all  square  with 
this  statement  of  the  case,  but  this  did  not  seem  a 
specially  fit  time  for  bringing  them  forth.  There 
was  indeed  a  sense  of  languid  repletion  in  his 
mind,  as  if  it  had  been  overfed  and  wanted  to  lie 
down  for  awhile.  He  contented  himself  with  nod 
ding  again,  and  murmuring  reflectively,  "Yes,  it 
is  all  strangely  different." 

His  tone  was  an  invitation  to  silence  ;  and  the 
doctor  turned  his  attention  to  the  cigar,  studying 

116 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

its  ash  for  a  minute  with  an  air  of  deep  medita 
tion,  and  then  solemnly  blowing  out  a  slow  series 
of  smoke-rings.  Theron  watched  him  with  an  in 
dolent,  placid  eye,  wondering  lazily  if  it  was,  after 
all,  so  very  pleasant  to  smoke. 

There  fell  upon  this  silence  —  with  a  softness 
so  delicate  that  it  came  almost  like  a  progression 
in  the  hush  —  the  sound  of  sweet  music.  For  a 
little,  strain  and  source  were  alike  indefinite,  —  an 
impalpable  setting  to  harmony  of  the  mellowed 
light,  the  perfumed  opalescence  of  the  air,  the  lux 
ury  and  charm  of  the  room.  Then  it  rose  as  by  a 
sweeping  curve  of  beauty,  into  a  firm,  calm,  severe 
melody,  delicious  to  the  ear,  but  as  cold  in  the 
mind's  vision  as  moonlit  sculpture.  It  went  on 
upward  with  stately  collectedness  of  power,  till  the 
atmosphere  seemed  all  alive  with  the  trembling 
consciousness  of  the  presence  of  lofty  souls,  sternly 
pure  and  pitilessly  great. 

Theron  found  himself  moved  as  he  had  never 
been  before.  He  almost  resented  the  discovery, 
when  it  was  presented  to  him  by  the  prosaic, 
mechanical  side  of  his  brain,  that  he  was  listening 
to  organ-music,  and  that  it  came  through  the  open 
window  from  the  church  close  by.  He  would  fain 
have  reclined  in  his  chair  and  closed  his  eyes,  and 
saturated  himself  with  the  uttermost  fulness  of  the 
sensation.  Yet,  in  absurd  despite  of  himself,  he 
rose  and  moved  over  to  the  window. 

Only  a  narrow  alley  separated  the  pastorate  from 
117 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  church ;  Mr.  Ware  could  have  touched  with  a 
walking-stick  the  opposite  wall.  Directly  facing 
him  was  the  arched  and  mullioned  top  of  a  great 
window.  A  dim  light  from  within  shone  through 
the  more  translucent  portions  of  the  glass  below, 
throwing  out  faint  little  bars  of  party-colored  radi 
ance  upon  the  blackness  of  the  deep  passage-way. 
He  could  vaguely  trace  by  these  the  outlines  of 
some  sort  of  picture  on  the  window.  There  were 
human  figures  in  it,  and  —  yes  —  up  here  in  the 
centre,  nearest  him,  was  a  woman's  head.  There 
was  a  halo  about  it,  engirdling  rich,  flowing  waves 
of  reddish  hair,  the  lights  in  which  glowed  like 
flame.  The  face  itself  was  barely  distinguishable, 
but  its  half- suggested  form  raised  a  curious  sense 
of  resemblance  to  some  other  face.  He  looked  at 
it  closely,  blankly,  the  noble  music  throbbing 
through  his  brain  meanwhile. 

"  It 's  that  Madden  girl !  "  he  suddenly  heard  a 
voice  say  by  his  side.  Dr.  Ledsmar  had  followed 
him  to  the  window,  and  was  close  at  his  shoulder. 

Theron's  thoughts  were  upon  the  puzzling 
shadowed  lineaments  on  the  stained  glass.  He 
saw  now  in  a  flash  the  resemblance  which  had 
baffled  him.  "It  is  like  her,  of  course,"  he  said. 

"  Yes,  unfortunately,  it  is  just  like  her,"  replied 
the  doctor,  with  a  hostile  note  in  his  voice. 
"Whenever  I  am  dining  here,  she  always  goes  in 
and  kicks  up  that  racket.  She  knows  I  hate  it." 

"  Oh,  you  mean  that  it  is  she  who  is  playing," 

118 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

remarked  Theron.  "  I  thought  you  referred  to  — 
at  least  —  I  was  thinking  of —  " 

His  sentence  died  off  in  inconsequence.  He 
had  a  feeling  that  he  did  not  want  to  talk  with  the 
doctor  about  the  stained-glass  likeness.  The  music 
had  sunk  away  now  into  fragmentary  and  uncon 
nected  passages,  broken  here  and  there  by  abrupt 
stops.  Dr.  Ledsmar  stretched  an  arm  out  past 
him  and  shut  the  window.  "  Let 's  hear  as  little 
of  the  row  as  we  can,"  he  said,  and  the  two  went 
back  to  their  chairs. 

"  Pardon  me  for  the  question,"  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Ware  said,  after  a  pause  which  began  to  affect 
him  as  constrained,  "  but  something  you  said 
about  dining  —  you  don't  live  here,  then  ?  In 
the  house,  I  mean?  " 

The  doctor  laughed,  —  a  characteristically  abrupt, 
dry  little  laugh,  which  struck  Theron  at  once  as 
bearing  a  sort  of  black-sheep  relationship  to  the 
priest's  habitual  chuckle.  "  That  must  have  been 
puzzling  you  no  end,"  he  said,  —  "  that  notion  that 
the  pastorate  kept  a  devil's  advocate  on  the  prem 
ises.  No,  Mr.  Ware,  I  don't  live  here.  I  inhabit 
a  house  of  my  own,  —  you  may  have  seen  it,  —  an 
old-fashioned  place  up  beyond  the  race-course, 
with  a  sort  of  tower  at  the  back,  and  a  big  garden. 
But  I  dine  here  three  or  four  times  a  week.  It  is 
an  old  arrangement  of  ours.  Vincent  and  I  have 
been  friends  for  many  years  now.  We  are  quite 
alone  in  the  world,  we  two,  —  much  to  our  mutual 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

satisfaction.  You  must  come  up  and  see  me  some 
time ;  come  up  arid  have  a  look  over  the  books 
we  were  speaking  of." 

"I  am  much  obliged,"  said  Theron,  without 
enthusiasm.  The  thought  of  the  doctor  by  him 
self  did  not  attract  him  greatly. 

The  reservation  in  his  tone  seemed  to  interest 
the  doctor.  "  1  suppose  you  are  the  first  man  I 
have  asked  in  a  dozen  years,"  he  remarked,  frankly 
willing  that  the  young  minister  should  appreciate 
the  favor  extended  him.  "  It  must  be  fully  that 
since  anybody  but  Vincent  Forbes  has  been  under 
my  roof;  that  is,  of  my  own  species,  I  mean." 

"  You  live  there  quite  alone,"  commented 
Theron. 

"  Quite  —  with  my  dogs  and  cats  and  lizards  — 
and  my  Chinaman.  I  must  n't  forget  him;"  The 
doctor  noted  the  inquiry  in  the  other's  lifted 
brows,  and  smilingly  explained.  "  He  is  my  soli 
tary  servant.  Possibly  he  might  not  appeal  to  you 
much ;  but  I  can  assure  you  he  used  to  interest 
Octavius  a  great  deal  when  I  first  brought  him 
here,  ten  years  ago  or  so.  He  afforded  occupa 
tion  for  all  the  idle  boys  in  the  village  for  a  twelve 
month  at  least.  They  used  to  lie  in  wait  for  him 
all  day  long,  with  stones  or  horse-chestnuts  or 
snowballs,  according  to  the  season.  The  Irish 
men  from  the  wagon-works  nearly  killed  him  once 
or  twice,  but  he  patiently  lived  it  all  down.  The 
Chinaman  has  the  patience  to  live  everything 

120 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

down,  —  the   Caucasian   races  included.     He 
see  us   all  to   bed,  will  that   gentleman  with  the 
pigtail !  " 

The  music  over  in  the  church  had  lifted  itself 
again  into  form  and  sequence,  and  defied  the 
closed  window.  If  anything,  it  was  louder  than 
before,  and  the  sonorous  roar  of  the  bass-pedals 
seemed  to  be  shaking  the  very  walls.  It  was 
something  with  a  big-lunged,  exultant,  triumphing 
swing  in  it,  —  something  which  ought  to  have  been 
sung  on  the  battlefield  at  the  close  of  day  by  the 
whole  jubilant  army  of  victors.  It  was  impossible 
to  pretend  not  to  be  listening  to  it ;  but  the  doctor 
submitted  with  an  obvious  scowl,  and  bit  off  the 
tip  of  his  third  cigar  with  an  annoyed  air. 

"  You  don't  seem  to  care  much  for  music," 
suggested  Mr.  Ware,  when  a  lull  came. 

Dr.  Ledsmar  looked  up,  lighted  match  in  hand. 
"  Say  musicians  !  "  he  growled.  "  Has  it  ever 
occurred  to  you,"  he  went  on,  between  puffs  at 
the  flame,  "  that  the  only  animals  who  make  the 
noises  we  call  music  are  of  the  bird  family,  —  a  de 
based  offshoot  of  the  reptilian  creation,  —  the  very 
lowest  types  of  the  vertebrata  now  in  existence? 
I  insist  upon  the  parallel  among  humans.  I  have 
in  my  time,  sir,  had  considerable  opportunities 
for  studying  close  at  hand  the  various  orders  of 
mammalia  who  devote  themselves  to  what  they 
describe  as  the  arts.  It  may  sound  a  harsh  judg 
ment,  but  I  am  convinced  that  musicians  stand 

121 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

on  the  very  bottom  rung  of  the  ladder  in  the  sub- 
cellar  of  human  intelligence,  —  even  lower  than 
painters  and  actors." 

This  seemed  such  unqualified  nonsense  to  the 
Rev.  Mr.  Ware  that  he  offered  no  comment  what 
ever  upon  it.  He  tried  instead  to  divert  his 
thoughts  to  the  stormy  strains  which  rolled  in 
through  the  vibrating  brickwork,  and  to  picture 
to  himself  the  large,  capable  figure  of  Miss  Madden 
seated  in  the  half-light  at  the  organ-board,  sway 
ing  to  and  fro  in  a  splendid  ecstasy  of  power  as 
she  evoked  at  will  this  superb  and  ordered  uproar. 
But  the  doctor  broke  insistently  in  upon  his 
musings. 

"  All  art,  so-called,  is  decay,"  he  said,  raising 
his  voice.  "  When  a  race  begins  to  brood  on  the 
beautiful,  —  so-called,  —  it  is  a  sign  of  rot,  of  get 
ting  ready  to  fall  from  the  tree.  Take  the  Jews,  — 
those  marvellous  old  fellows,  —  who  were  never 
more  than  a  handful,  yet  have  imposed  the  rule 
of  their  ideas  and  their  gods  upon  us  for  fifteen 
hundred  years.  Why?  They  were  forbidden  by 
their  most  fundamental  law  to  make  sculptures  or 
pictures.  That  was  at  a  time  when  the  Egyptians, 
when  the  Assyrians,  and  other  Semites,  were  run 
ning  to  artistic  riot.  Every  great  museum  in  the 
world  now  has  whole  floors  devoted  to  statues 
from  the  Nile,  and  marvellous  carvings  from  the 
palaces  of  Sargon  and  Assurbanipal.  You  can  get 
the  artistic  remains  of  the  Jews  during  that  whole 

122 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

period  into  a  child's  wheelbarrow.  They  had  the 
sense  and  strength  to  penalize  art ;  they  alone  sur 
vived.  They  saw  the  Egyptians  go,  the  Assyrians 
go,  the  Greeks  go,  the  late  Romans  go,  the  Moors 
in  Spain  go,  —  all  the  artistic  peoples  perish.  They 
remained  triumphing  over  all.  Now  at  last  their 
long-belated  apogee  is  here ;  their  decline  is  at 
hand.  I  am  told  that  in  this  present  generation 
in  Europe  the  Jews  are  producing  a  great  lot  of 
young  painters  and  sculptors  and  actors,  just  as 
for  a  century  they  have  been  producing  famous 
composers  and  musicians.  That  means  the  end 
of  the  Jews  !  " 

"  What !  have  yon  only  got  as  far  as  that  ?  '* 
came  the  welcome  interruption  of  a  cheery  voice. 
Father  Forbes  had  entered  the  room,  and  stood 
looking  down  with  a  whimsical  twinkle  in  his  eye 
from  one  to  the  other  of  his  guests. 

"  You  must  have  been  taken  over  the  ground  at 
a  very  slow  pace,  Mr.  Ware,"  he  continued,  chuck 
ling  softly,  "  to  have  arrived  merely  at  the  collapse 
of  the  New  Jerusalem.  I  fancied  I  had  given  him 
time  enough  to  bring  you  straight  up  to  the  end 
of  all  of  us,  with  that  Chinaman  of  his  gently  slap 
ping  our  graves  with  his  pigtail.  That 's  where  the 
doctor  always  winds  up,  if  he  's  allowed  to  run  his 
course." 

"  It  has  all  been  very  interesting,  extremely  so, 
I  assure  you,"  faltered  Theron.  It  had  become 
suddenly  apparent  to  him  that  he  desired  nothing 

123 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

so  much  as  to  make  his  escape,  —  that  he  had  in 
deed  only  been  waiting  for  the  host's  return  to 
do  so. 

He  rose  at  this,  and  explained  that  he  must  be 
going.  No  special  effort  being  put  forth  to  re 
strain  him,  he  presently  made  his  way  out,  Father 
Forbes  hospitably  following  him  down  to  the  door, 
and  putting  a  very  gracious  cordiality  into  his 
adieux. 

The  night  was  warm  and  black.  Theron  stood 
still  in  it  the  moment  the  pastorate  door  had  closed  ; 
the  sudden  darkness  was  so  thick  that  it  was  as  if 
he  had  closed  his  eyes.  His  dominant  sensation 
was  of  a  deep  relief  and  rest  after  some  undue 
fatigue.  It  crossed  his  mind  that  drunken  men 
probably  felt  like  that  as  they  leaned  against  things 
on  their  way  home.  He  was  affected  himself,  he 
saw,  by  the  weariness  and  half-nausea  following  a 
mental  intoxication.  The  conceit  pleased  him, 
and  he  smiled  to  himself  as  he  turned  and  took  the 
first  homeward  steps.  It  must  be  growing  late, 
he  thought.  Alice  would  be  wondering  as  she 
waited. 

There  was  a  street  lamp  at  the  corner,  and  as 
he  walked  toward  it  he  noted  all  at  once  that  his 
feet  were  keeping  step  to  the  movement  of  the 
music  proceeding  from  the  organ  within  the  church, 
—  a  vaguely  processional  air,  marked  enough  in 
measure,  but  still  with  a  dreamy  effect.  It  be 
came  a  pleasure  to  identify  his  progress  with  the 

124 


quaint  rhythm  of  sound  as  he  sauntered  along. 
He  discovered,  as  he  neared  the  light,  that  he 
was  instinctively  stepping  over  the  seams  in  the 
flagstone  sidewalk  as  he  had  done  as  a  boy.  He 
smiled  again  at  this.  There  was  something  ex 
ceptionally  juvenile  and  buoyant  about  his  mood, 
now  that  he  examined  it.  He  set  it  down  as  a 
reaction  from  that  doctor's  extravagant  and  incen 
diary  talk.  One  thing  was  certain,  —  he  would 
never  be  caught  up  at  that  house  beyond  the  race 
course,  with  its  reptiles  and  its  Chinaman.  Should 
he  ever  even  go  to  the  pastorate  again?  He  de 
cided  not  to  quite  definitely  answer  that  in  the 
negative,  but  as  he  felt  now,  the  chances  were  all 
against  it. 

Turning  the  corner,  and  walking  off  into  the 
shadows  along  the  side  of  the  huge  church  build 
ing,  Theron  noted,  almost  at  the  end  of  the  edifice, 
a  small  door,  —  the  entrance  to  a  porch  coming 
out  to  the  sidewalk,  —  which  stood  wide  open.  A 
thin,  pale,  vertical  line  of  light  showed  that  ihe 
inner  door,  too,  was  ajar. 

Through  this  wee  aperture  the  organ- music,  re 
duced  and  mellowed  by  distance,  came  to  him 
again  with  that  same  curious,  intimate,  personal 
relation  which  had  so  moved  him  at  the  start, 
before  the  doctor  closed  the  window.  It  was  as 
if  it  was  being  played  for  him  alone. 

He  paused  for  a  doubting  minute  or  two,  with 
bowed  head,  listening  to  the  exquisite  harmony 

125 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

which  floated  out  to  caress  and  soothe  and  enfold 
him.  There  was  no  spiritual,  or  at  least  pious, 
effect  in  it  now.  He  fancied  that  it  must  be 
secular  music,  or,  if  not,  then  something  adapted 
to  marriage  ceremonies,  —  rich,  vivid,  passionate,  a 
celebration  of  beauty  and  the  glory  of  possession, 
with  its  ruling  note  of  joy  only  heightened  by  soft, 
wooing  interludes,  and  here  and  there  the  tremor 
of  a  fond,  timid  little  sob. 

Theron  turned  away  irresolutely,  half  frightened 
at  the  undreamt-of  impression  this  music  was  mak 
ing  upon  him.  Then,  all  at  once,  he  wheeled  and 
stepped  boldly  into  the  porch,  pushing  the  inner 
door  open  and  hearing  it  rustle  against  its  leathern 
frame  as  it  swung  to  behind  him. 

He  had  never  been  inside  a  Catholic  church 
before. 


126 


CHAPTER   IX 

JEREMIAH  MADDEN  was  supposed  to  be  probably 
the  richest  man  in  Octavius.  There  was  no  doubt 
at  all  about  his  being  its  least  pretentious  citizen. 

The  huge  and  ornate  modern  mansion  which  he 
had  built,  putting  to  shame  every  other  house  in 
the  place,  gave  an  effect  of  ostentation  to  the 
Maddens  as  a  family ;  it  seemed  only  to  accen 
tuate  the  air  of  humility  which  enveloped  Jeremiah 
as  with  a  garment.  Everybody  knew  some  version 
of  the  many  tales  afloat  which,  in  a  kindly  spirit, 
illustrated  the  incongruity  between  him  and  his 
splendid  habitation.  Some  had  it  that  he  slept  in 
the  shed.  Others  told  whimsical  stories  of  his 
sitting  alone  in  the  kitchen  evenings,  smoking  his 
old  clay  pipe,  and  sorrowing  because  the  second 
Mrs.  Madden  would  not  suffer  the  pigs  and 
chickens  to  come  in  and  bear  him  company.  But 
no  matter  how  comic  the  exaggeration,  these 
legends  were  invariably  amiable.  It  lay  in  no 
man's  mouth  to  speak  harshly  of  Jeremiah 
Madden. 

He  had  been  born  a  Connemara  peasant,  and 
he  would  die  one.  When  he  was  ten  years  old  he 
had  seen  some  of  his  own  family,  and  most  of  his 

127 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

neighbors,  starve  to  death.  He  could  remember 
looking  at  the  stiffened  figure  of  a  woman  stretched 
on  the  stones  by  the  roadside,  with  the  green  stain 
of  nettles  on  her  white  lips.  A  girl  five  years  or 
so  older  than  himself,  also  a  Madden  and  distantly 
related,  had  started  in  despair  off  across  the  moun 
tains  to  the  town  where  it  was  said  the  poor-law 
officers  were  dealing  out  food.  He  could  recall 
her  coming  back  next  day,  wild-eyed  with  hunger 
and  the  fever ;  the  officers  had  refused  her  relief 
because  her  bare  legs  were  not  wholly  shrunken  to 
the  bone.  "  While  there  's  a  calf  on  the  shank, 
there  's  no  starvation,"  they  had  explained  to  her. 
The  girl  died  without  profiting  by  this  official 
apothegm.  The  boy  found  it  burned  ineffaceably 
upon  his  brain.  Now,  after  a  lapse  of  more  than 
forty  years,  it  seemed  the  thing  that  he  remem 
bered  best  about  Ireland. 

He  had  drifted  westward  as  an  unconsidered, 
unresisting  item  in  that  vast  flight  of  the  famine 
years.  Others  whom  he  rubbed  against  in  that 
melancholy  exodus,  and  deemed  of  much  greater 
promise  than  himself,  had  done  badly.  Somehow 
he  did  well.  He  learned  the  wheelwright's  trade, 
and  really  that  seemed  all  there  was  to  tell.  The 
rest  had  been  calm  and  sequent  progression,  — 
steady  employment  as  a  journeyman  first ;  then 
marriage  and  a  house  and  lot ;  the  modest  start 
as  a  master ;  the  move  to  Octavius  and  cheap 
lumber ;  the  growth  of  his  business,  always  marked 

128 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

of  late  years  stupendous,  —  all  following  naturally, 
easily,  one  thing  out  of  another.  Jeremiah  en 
countered  the  idea  among  his  fellows,  now  and 
again,  that  he  was  entitled  to  feel  proud  of  all  this. 
He  smiled  to  himself  at  the  thought,  and  then 
sent  a  sigh  after  the  smile.  What  was  it  all  but 
empty  and  transient  vanity?  The  score  of  other 
Connemara  boys  he  had  known  —  none  very  for 
tunate,  several  broken  tragically  in  prison  or  the 
gutter,  nearly  all  now  gone  the  way  of  flesh  —  were 
as  good  as  he.  He  could  not  have  it  in  his  heart 
to  take  credit  for  his  success ;  it  would  have  been 
like  sneering  over  their  poor  graves. 

Jeremiah  Madden  was  now  fifty-three,  —  a  little 
man  of  a  reddened,  weather-worn  skin  and  a  medi 
tative,  almost  saddened,  aspect.  He  had  blue 
eyes,  but  his  scanty  iron-gray  hair  showed  raven 
black  in  its  shadows.  The  width  and  prominence 
of  his  cheek-bones  dominated  all  one's  recollec 
tions  of  his  face.  The  long  vertical  upper-lip  and 
irregular  teeth  made,  in  repose,  an  unshapely 
mouth ;  its  smile,  though,  sweetened  the  whole 
countenance.  He  wore  a  fringe  of  stiff,  steel- 
colored  beard,  passing  from  ear  to  ear  under  his 
chin.  His  week-day  clothes  were  as  simple  as  his 
workaday  manners,  fitting  his  short  black  pipe  and 
his  steadfast  devotion  to  his  business.  On  Sun 
days  he  dressed  with  a  certain  rigor  of  respecta 
bility,  all  in  black,  and  laid  aside  tobacco,  at  least 
to  the  public  view.  He  never  missed  going  to  the 
9  129 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

early  Low  Mass,  quite  alone.      His  family  always 
came  later,  at  the  ten  o'clock  High  Mass. 

There  had  been,  at  one  time  or  another,  a  good 
many  members  of  this  family.  Two  wives  had 
borne  Jeremiah  Madden  a  total  of  over  a  dozen 
children.  Of  these  there  survived  now  only  two 
of  the  first  Mrs.  Madden's  offspring  —  Michael  and 
Celia  —  and  a  son  of  the  present  wife,  who  had 
been  baptized  Terence,  but  called  himself  Theo 
dore.  This  minority  of  the  family  inhabited  the 
great  new  house  on  Main  Street.  Jeremiah  went 
every  Sunday  afternoon  by  himself  to  kneel  in  the 
presence  of  the  majority,  there  where  they  lay  in 
Saint  Agnes'  consecrated  ground.  If  the  weather 
was  good,  he  generally  extended  his  walk  through 
the  fields  to  an  old  deserted  Catholic  burial-field, 
which  had  been  used  only  in  the  first  years  after 
the  famine  invasion,  and  now  was  clean  forgotten. 
The  old  wagon-maker  liked  to  look  over  the  prim 
itive,  neglected  stones  which  marked  the  graves  of 
these  earlier  exiles.  Fully  half  of  the  inscriptions 
mentioned  his  County  Galway,  —  there  were  two 
naming  the  very  parish  adjoining  his.  The  latest 
date  on  any  stone  was  of  the  remoter  fifties. 
They  had  all  been  stricken  down,  here  in  this 
strange  land  with  its  bitter  winters,  while  the 
memory  of  their  own  soft,  humid,  gentle  west- 
coast  air  was  fresh  within  them.  Musing  upon  the 
clumsy  sculpture,  with  its  "  R.  I.  P.,"  or  "  Pray  for 
the  Soul  of,"  half  to  be  guessed  under  the  stain 

130 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  moss  of  a  generation,  there  would  seem  to 
him  but  a  step  from  this  present  to  that  heart 
rending,  awful  past.  What  had  happened  between 
was  a  meaningless  vision,  —  as  impersonal  as  the 
passing  of  the  planets  overhead.  He  rarely  had 
an  impulse  to  tears  in  the  new  cemetery,  where  his 
ten  children  were.  He  never  left  this  weed-grown, 
forsaken  old  God's-acre  dry- eyed. 

One  must  not  construct  from  all  this  the  image 
of  a  melancholy  man,  as  his  fellows  met  and  knew 
him.  Mr.  Madden  kept  his  griefs,  racial  and  indi 
vidual,  for  his  own  use.  To  the  men  about  him  in 
the  offices  and  the  shops  he  presented  day  after 
day,  year  after  year,  an  imperturbable  cheeriness 
of  demeanor.  He  had  been  always  fortunate  in 
the  selection  of  lieutenants  and  chief  helpers.  Two 
of  these  had  grown  now  into  partners,  and  were 
almost  as  much  a  part  of  the  big  enterprise  as 
Jeremiah  himself.  They  spoke  often  of  their 
inability  to  remember  any  unjust  or  petulant  word 
of  his,  —  much  less  any  unworthy  deed.  Once 
they  had  seen  him  in  a  great  rage,  all  the  more 
impressive  because  he  said  next  to  nothing.  A 
thoughtless  fellow  told  a  dirty  story  in  the  pres 
ence  of  some  apprentices ;  and  Madden,  listening 
to  this,  drove  the  offender  implacably  from  his 
employ.  It  was  years  now  since  any  one  who  knew 
him  had  ventured  upon  lewd  pleasantries  in  his 
hearing.  Jokes  of  the  sort  which  women  might 
hear  he  was  very  fond  of,  though  he  had  not 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

much  humor  of  his  own.  Of  books  he  knew 
nothing  whatever,  and  he  made  only  the  most 
perfunctory  pretence  now  and  again  of  reading 
the  newspapers. 

The  elder  son  Michael  was  very  like  his  father, 
—  diligent,  unassuming,  kindly,  and  simple,  —  a 
plain,  tall,  thin  red  man  of  nearly  thirty,  who 
toiled  in  paper  cap  and  rolled-up  shirt-sleeves  as 
the  superintendent  in  the  saw-mill,  and  put  on  no 
airs  whatever  as  the  son  of  the  master.  If  there 
was  surprise  felt  at  his  not  being  taken  into  the 
firm  as  a  partner,  he  gave  no  hint  of  sharing  it. 
He  attended  to  his  religious  duties  with  great  zeal, 
and  was  President  of  the  Sodality  as  a  matter  of 
course.  This  was  regarded  as  his  blind  side ;  and 
young  employees  who  cultivated  it,  and  made 
broad  their  phylacteries  under  his  notice,  certainly 
had  an  added  chance  of  getting  on  well  in  the 
works.  To  some  few  whom  he  knew  specially 
well,  Michael  would  confess  that  if  he  had  had  the 
brains  for  it,  he  should  have  wished  to  be  a  priest. 
He  displayed  no  inclination  to  marry. 

The  other  son,  Terence,  was  some  eight 
years  younger,  and  seemed  the  product  of  a 
wholly  different  race.  The  contrast  between 
Michael's  sandy  skin  and  long  gaunt  visage  and 
this  dark  boy's  handsome,  rounded  face,  with  its 
prettily  curling  black  hair,  large,  heavily  fringed 
brown  eyes,  and  delicately  modelled  features,  was 
not  more  obvious  than  their  temperamental  sepa- 

132 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ration.  This  second  lad  had  been  away  for  years 
at  school,  —  indeed,  at  a  good  many  schools,  for 
no  one  seemed  to  manage  to  keep  him  long.  He 
had  been  with  the  Jesuits  at  Georgetown,  with  the 
Christian  Brothers  at  Manhattan ;  the  sectarian 
Mt.  St.  Mary's  and  the  severely  secular  Annapolis 
had  both  been  tried,  and  proved  misfits.  The 
young  man  was  home  again  now,  and  save  that  his 
name  had  become  Theodore,  he  appeared  in  no 
wise  changed  from  the  beautiful,  wilful,  bold,  and 
showy  boy  who  had  gone  away  in  his  teens.  He 
was  still  rather  small  for  his  years,  but  so  grace 
fully  moulded  in  form,  and  so  perfectly  tailored, 
that  the  fact  seemed  rather  an  advantage  than 
otherwise.  He  never  dreamed  of  going  near  the 
wagon- works,  but  he  did  go  a  good  deal  —  in  fact, 
most  of  the  time  —  to  the  Nedahma  Club.  His 
mother  spoke  often  to  her  friends  about  her  fears 
for  his  health.  He  never  spoke  to  his  friends 
about  his  mother  at  all. 

The  second  Mrs.  Madden  did  not,  indeed, 
appeal  strongly  to  the  family  pride.  She  had  been 
a  Miss  Foley,  a  dress-maker,  and  an  old  maid. 
Jeremiah  had  married  her  after  a  brief  widower- 
hood,  principally  because  she  was  the  sister  of  his 
parish  priest,  and  had  a  considerable  reputation 
for  piety.  It  was  at  a  time  when  the  expansion  of 
his  business  was  promising  cercain  wealth,  and 
suggesting  the  removal  to  Octavius.  He  was  con 
scious  of  a  notion  that  his  obligations  to  social 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

respectability  were  increasing ;  it  was  certain  that 
the  embarrassments  of  a  motherless  family  were. 
Miss  Foley  had  shown  a  good  deal  of  attention  to 
his  little  children.  She  was  not  ill-looking ;  she 
bore  herself  with  modesty;  she  was  the  priest's 
sister,  —  the  niece  once  removed  of  a  vicar-gen 
eral.  And  so  it  came  about. 

Although  those  most  concerned  did  not  say  so, 
everybody  could  see  from  the  outset  the  pity  of  its 
ever  having  come  about  at  all.  The  pious  and 
stiffly  respectable  priest's  sister  had  been  harmless 
enough  as  a  spinster.  It  made  the  heart  ache  to 
contemplate  her  as  a  wife.  Incredibly  narrow- 
minded,  ignorant,  suspicious,  vain,  and  sour- 
tempered,  she  must  have  driven  a  less  equable 
and  well-rooted  man  than  Jeremiah  Madden  to 
drink  or  flight.  He  may  have  had  his  temptations, 
but  they  made  no  mark  on  the  even  record  of  his 
life.  He  only  worked  the  harder,  concentrating 
upon  his  business  those  extra  hours  which  another 
sort  of  home-life  would  have  claimed  instead. 
The  end  of  twenty  years  found  him  a  rich  man, 
but  still  toiling  pertinaciously  day  by  day,  as  if  he 
had  his  wage  to  earn.  In  the  great  house  which 
had  been  built  to  please,  or  rather  placate,  his 
wife,  he  kept  to  himself  as  much  as  possible.  The 
popular  story  of  his  smoking  alone  in  the  kitchen 
was  more  or  less  true ;  only  Michael  as  a  rule  sat 
with  him,  too  weak-lunged  for  tobacco  himself,  but 
reading  stray  scraps  from  the  papers  to  the  lonely 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

old  man,  and  talking  with  him  about  the  works, 
the  while  Jeremiah  meditatively  sucked  his  clay 
pipe.  One  or  two  evenings  in  the  week  the  twain 
spent  up  in  Celia's  part  of  the  house,  listening  with 
the  awe  of  simple,  honest  mechanics  to  the  music 
she  played  for  them. 

Celia  was  to  them  something  indefinably  less, 
indescribably  more,  than  a  daughter  and  sister. 
They  could  not  think  there  had  ever  been  any 
thing  like  her  before  in  the  world ;  the  notion  of 
criticising  any  deed  or  word  of  hers  would  have 
appeared  to  them  monstrous  and  unnatural. 

She  seemed  to  have  come  up  to  this  radiant  and 
wise  and  marvellously  talented  womanhood  of  hers, 
to  their  minds,  quite  spontaneously.  There  had 
been  a  little  Celia,  —  a  red-headed,  sulky,  mutinous 
slip  of  a  girl,  always  at  war  with  her  step-mother, 
and  affording  no  special  comfort  or  hope  to  the 
rest  of  the  family.  Then  there  was  a  long  gap, 
during  which  the  father,  four  times  a  year,  handed 
Michael  a  letter  he  had  received  from  the  superi 
oress  of  a  distant  convent,  referring  with  cold  for 
mality  to  the  studies  and  discipline  by  which  Miss 
Madden  might  profit  more  if  she  had  been  better 
brought  up,  and  enclosing  a  large  bill.  Then  all 
at  once  they  beheld  a  big  Celia,  whom  they  spoke 
of  as  being  home  again,  but  who  really  seemed 
never  to  have  been  there  before,  —  a  tall,  hand 
some,  confident  young  woman,  swift  of  tongue  and 
apprehension,  appearing  to  know  everything  there 


was  to  be  known  by  the  most  learned,  able  to 
paint  pictures,  carve  wood,  speak  in  divers  lan 
guages,  and  make  music  for  the  gods,  yet  with  it 
all  a  very  proud  lady,  one  might  say  a  queen. 

The  miracle  of  such  a  Celia  as  this  impressed 
itself  even  upon  the  step-mother.  Mrs.  Madden 
had  looked  forward  with  a  certain  grim  tightening 
of  her  combative  jaws  to  the  home-coming  of  the 
"  red-head."  She  felt  herself  much  more  the  fine 
lady  now  than  she  had  been  when  the  girl  went 
away.  She  had  her  carriage  now,  and  the  mag 
nificent  new  house  was  nearly  finished,  and  she  had 
a  greater  number  of  ailments,  and  spent  far  more 
money  on  doctor's  bills,  than  any  other  lady  in 
the  whole  section.  The  flush  of  pride  in  her 
greatest  achievement  up  to  date  —  having  the 
most  celebrated  of  New  York  physicians  brought 
up  to  Octavius  by  special  train  —  still  prickled  in 
her  blood.  It  was  in  all  the  papers,  and  the 
admiration  of  the  flatterers  and  "  soft-sawdherers  " 
—  wives  of  Irish  merchants  and  smaller  profes 
sional  men  who  formed  her  social  circle  —  was 
raising  visions  in  her  poor  head  of  going  next  year 
with  Theodore  to  Saratoga,  and  fastening  the 
attention  of  the  whole  fashionable  republic  upon 
the  variety  and  resources  of  her  invalidism.  Mrs. 
Madden's  fancy  did  not  run  to  the  length  of  seeing 
her  step-daughter  also  at  Saratoga ;  it  pictured 
her  still  as  the  sullen  and  hated  "  red-head," 
moping  defiantly  in  corners,  or  courting  by  her 

136 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

insolence  the  punishments  which  leaped  against 
their  leash  in  the  step-mother's  mind  to  get  at  her. 

The  real  Celia,  when  she  came,  fairly  took  Mrs. 
Madden' s  breath  away.  The  peevish  little  plans 
for  annoyance  and  tyranny,  the  resolutions  born  of 
ignorant  and  jealous  egotism,  found  themselves 
swept  out  of  sight  by  the  very  first  swirl  of  Celia's 
dress-train,  when  she  came  down  from  her  room 
robed  in  peacock  blue.  The  step-mother  could 
only  stare. 

Now,  after  two  years  of  it,  Mrs.  Madden  still 
viewed  her  step-daughter  with  round-eyed  uncer 
tainty,  not  unmixed  with  wrathful  fear.  She 
still  drove  about  behind  two  magnificent  horses ; 
the  new  house  had  become  almost  tiresome  by 
familiarity ;  her  pre-eminence  in  the  interested 
minds  of  the  Dearborn  County  Medical  Society  was 
as  towering  as  ever,  but  somehow  it  was  all 
different.  There  was  a  note  of  unreality  nowadays 
in  Mrs.  Donnelly's  professions  of  wonder  at  her 
bearing  up  under  her  multiplied  maladies ;  there 
was  almost  a  leer  of  mockery  in  the  sympathetic 
smirk  with  which  the  Misses  Mangan  listened  to 
her  symptoms.  Even  the  doctors,  though  they 
kept  their  faces  turned  toward  her,  obviously  did 
not  pay  much  attention ;  the  people  in  the  street 
seemed  no  longer  to  look  at  her  and  her  equipage 
at  all.  Worst  of  all,  something  of  the  meaning  of 
this  managed-  to  penetrate  her  own  mind.  She 
caught  now  and  again  a  dim  glimpse  of  herself  as 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

others  must  have  been  seeing  her  for  years,  —  as  a 
stupid,  ugly,  boastful,  and  bad-tempered  old  nui 
sance.  And  it  was  always  as  if  she  saw  this  in  a 
mirror  held  up  by  Celia. 

Of  open  discord  there  had  been  next  to  none. 
Celia  would  not  permit  it,  and  showed  this  so 
clearly  from  the  start  that  there  was  scarcely  need 
for  her  saying  it.  It  seemed  hardly  necessary  for 
her  to  put  into  words  any  of  her  desires,  for  that 
matter.  All  existing  arrangements  in  the  Madden 
household  seemed  to  shrink  automatically  and 
make  room  for  her,  whichever  way  she  walked. 
A  whole  quarter  of  the  unfinished  house  set  itself 
apart  for  her.  Partitions  altered  themselves ;  door 
ways  moved  across  to  opposite  sides ;  a  recess 
opened  itself,  tall  and  deep,  for  it  knew  not  what 
statue,  —  simply  because,  it  seemed,  the  Lady  Celia 
willed  it  so. 

When  the  family  moved  into  this  mansion,  it 
was  with  a  consciousness  that  the  only  one  who 
really  belonged  there  was  Celia.  She  alone  could 
behave  like  one  perfectly  at  home.  It  seemed 
entirely  natural  to  the  others  that  she  should  do 
just  what  she  liked,  shut  them  off  from  her  portion 
of  the  house,  take  her  meals  there  if  she  felt  dis 
posed,  and  keep  such  hours  as  pleased  her  instant 
whim.  If  she  awakened  them  at  midnight  by  her 
piano,  or  deferred  her  breakfast  to  the  late  after 
noon,  they  felt  that  it  must  be  all  right,  since 
Celia  did  it.  She  had  one  room  furnished  with 

138 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

only  divans  and  huge,  soft  cushions,  its  walls 
covered  with  large  copies  of  statuary  not  too 
strictly  clothed,  which  she  would  suffer  no  one, 
not  even  the  servants,  to  enter.  Michael  fancied 
sometimes,  when  he  passed  the  draped  entrance 
to  this  sacred  chamber,  that  the  portiere  smelt  of 
tobacco,  but  he  would  not  have  spoken  of  it,  even 
had  he  been  sure.  Old  Jeremiah,  whose  estab 
lished  habit  it  was  to  audit  minutely  the  expenses 
of  his  household,  covered  over  round  sums  to 
Celia's  separate  banking  account,  upon  the  mere 
playful  hint  of  her  holding  her  check-book  up, 
without  a  dream  of  questioning  her. 

That  the  step-mother  had  joy,  or  indeed  any 
thing  but  gall  and  wormwood,  out  of  all  this  is 
not  to  be  pretended.  There  lingered  along  in 
the  recollection  of  the  family  some  vague  memo 
ries  of  her  having  tried  to  assert  an  authority  over 
Celia's  comings  and  goings  at  the  outset,  but 
they  grouped  themselves  as  only  parts  of  the  gen 
eral  disorder  of  moving  and  settling,  which  a  fort 
night  or  so  quite  righted.  Mrs.  Madden  still 
permitted  herself  a  certain  license  of  hostile 
comment  when  her  step-daughter  was  not  present, 
and  listened  with  gratification  to  what  the  women 
of  her  acquaintance  ventured  upon  saying  in  the 
same  spirit ;  but  actual  interference  or  remonstrance 
she  never  offered  nowadays.  The  two  rarely  met, 
for  that  matter,  and  exchanged  only  the  baldest 
and  curtest  forms  of  speech. 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Celia  Madden  interested  all  Octavius  deeply. 
This  she  must  have  done  in  any  case,  if  only 
because  she  was  the  only  daughter  of  its  richest 
citizen.  But  the  bold,  luxuriant  quality  of  her 
beauty,  the  original  and  piquant  freedom  of  her 
manners,  the  stories  told  in  gossip  about  her  law 
lessness  at  home,  her  intellectual  attainments,  and 
artistic  vagaries,  —  these  were  even  more  exciting. 
The  unlikelihood  of  her  marrying  any  one  —  at 
least  any  Octavian  —  was  felt  to  add  a  certain 
romantic  zest  to  the  image  she  made  on  the  local 
perceptions.  There  was  no  visible  young  Irish 
man  at  all  approaching  the  social  and  financial 
standard  of  the  Maddens ;  it  was  taken  for  granted 
that  a  mixed  marriage  was  quite  out  of  the  ques 
tion  in  this  case.  She  seemed  to  have  more 
business  about  the  church  than  even  the  priest. 
She  was  always  playing  the  organ,  or  drilling  the 
choir,  or  decorating  the  altars  with  flowers,  or 
looking  over  the  robes  of  the  acolytes  for  rents 
and  stains,  or  going  in  or  out  of  the  pastorate. 
Clearly  this  was  not  the  sort  of  girl  to  take  a 
Protestant  husband. 

The  gossip  of  the  town  concerning  her  was, 
however,  exclusively  Protestant.  The  Irish  spoke 
of  her,  even  among  themselves,  but  seldom.  There 
was  no  occasion  for  them  to  pretend  to  like  her : 
they  did  not  know  her,  except  in  the  most  distant 
and  formal  fashion.  Even  the  members  of  the 
choir,  of  both  sexes,  had  the  sense  of  being  held 

140 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

away  from  her  at  haughty  arm's  length.  No 
single  parishioner  dreamed  of  calling  her  friend. 
But  when  they  referred  to  her,  it  was  always  with 
a  cautious  and  respectful  reticence.  For  one 
thing,  she  was  the  daughter  of  their  chief  man,  the 
man  they  most  esteemed  and  loved.  For  another, 
reservations  they  may  have  had  in  their  souls  about 
her  touched  close  upon  a  delicately  sore  spot.  It 
could  not  escape  their  notice  that  their  Protestant 
neighbors  were  watching  her  with  vigilant  curiosity, 
and  with  a  certain  tendency  to  wink  when  her 
name  came  into  conversation  along  with  that  of 
Father  Forbes.  It  had  never  yet  got  beyond  a 
tendency,  —  the  barest  fluttering  suggestion  of  a 
tempted  eyelid,  —  but  the  whole  Irish  population 
of  the  place  felt  themselves  to  be  waiting,  with 
clenched  fists  but  sinking  hearts,  for  the  wink 
itself. 

The  Rev.  Theron  Ware  had  not  caught  even  the 
faintest  hint  of  these  overtures  to  suspicion. 

When  he  had  entered  the  huge,  dark,  cool  vault 
of  the  church,  he  could  see  nothing  at  first  but  a 
faint  light  up  over  the  gallery,  far  at  the  other  end. 
Then,  little  by  little,  his  surroundings  shaped  them 
selves  out  of  the  gloom.  To  his  right  was  a  rail 
and  some  broad  steps  rising  toward  a  softly  con 
fused  mass  of  little  gray  vertical  bars  and  the  pale 
twinkle  of  tiny  spots  of  gilded  reflection,  which  he 
made  out  in  the  dusk  to  be  the  candles  and  trap 
pings  of  the  altar.  Overhead  the  great  arches 

141 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

faded  away  from  foundations  of  dimly  discernible 
capitals  into  utter  blackness.  There  was  a  strange 
medicinal  odor — as  of  cubeb  cigarettes  —  in  the 
air. 

After  a  little  pause,  he  tiptoed  noiselessly  up  the 
side  aisle  toward  the  end  of  the  church,  —  toward 
the  light  above  the  gallery.  This  radiance  from  a 
single  gas-jet  expanded  as  he  advanced,  and 
spread  itself  upward  over  a  burnished  row  of 
monster  metal  pipes,  which  went  towering  into  the 
darkness  like  giants.  They  were  roaring  at  him 
now,  —  a  sonorous,  deafening,  angry  bellow,  whicri 
made  everything  about  him  vibrate.  The  gallery 
balustrade  hid  the  keyboard  and  the  organist  from 
view.  There  were  only  these  jostling  brazen  tubes, 
as  big  round  as  trees  and  as  tall,  trembling  with 
their  own  furious  thunder.  It  was  for  all  the 
world  as  if  he  had  wandered  into  some  vast  tragi 
cal,  enchanted  cave,  and  was  being  drawn  against 
his  will  —  like  fascinated  bird  and  python  — 
toward  fate  at  the  savage  hands  of  these  swollen 
and  enraged  genii. 

He  stumbled  in  the  obscure  light  over  a  kneel- 
ing-stool,  making  a  considerable  racket.  On  the 
instant  the  noise  from  the  organ  ceased,  and  he 
saw  the  black  figure  of  a  woman  rise  above  the 
gallery-rail  and  look  down. 

"Who  is  it?"  the  indubitable  voice  of  Miss 
Madden  demanded  sharply. 

Theron  had  a  sudden  sheepish  notion  of  turning 
142 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  running.  With  the  best  grace  he  could  sum 
mon,  he  called  out  an  explanation  instead. 

"  Wait  a  minute.  I  'm  through  now.  I  'm  com 
ing  down,"  she  returned.  He  thought  there  was 
a  note  of  amusement  in  her  tone. 

She  came  to  him  a  moment  later,  accompanied 
by  a  thin,  tall  man,  whom  Theron  could  barely  see 
in  the  dark,  now  that  the  organ-light  too  was  gone. 
This  man  lighted  a  match  or  two  to  enable  them 
to  make  their  way  out. 

When  they  were  on  the  sidewalk,  Celia  spoke  : 
"  Walk  on  ahead,  Michael !  "  she  said.  "  I  have 
some  matters  to  speak  of  with  Mr.  Ware." 


14-5 


CHAPTER   X 

"WELL,  what  did  you  think  of  Dr.  Ledsmar?  " 
The  girl's  abrupt  question  came  as  a  relief  to 
Theron.  They  were  walking  along  in  a  darkness 
so  nearly  complete  that  he  could  see  next  to  noth 
ing  of  his  companion.  For  some  reason,  this 
seemed  to  suggest  a  sort  of  impropriety.  He  had 
listened  to  the  footsteps  of  the  man  ahead,  —  whom 
he  guessed  to  be  a  servant,  —  and  pictured  him  as 
intent  upon  getting  up  early  next  morning  to  tell 
everybody  that  the  Methodist  minister  had  stolen 
into  the  Catholic  church  at  night  to  walk  home 
with  Miss  Madden.  That  was  going  to  be  very 
awkward,  —  yes,  worse  than  awkward  !  It  might 
mean  ruin  itself.  She  had  mentioned  aloud  that 
she  had  matters  to  talk  over  with  him  :  that  of 
course  implied  confidences,  and  the  man  might 
put  heaven  only  knew  what  construction  on  that. 
It  was  notorious  that  servants  did  ascribe  the  very 
worst  motives  to  those  they  worked  for.  The  bare 
thought  of  the  delight  an  Irish  servant  would  have 
in  also  dragging  a  Protestant  clergyman  into  the 
thing  was  sickening.  And  what  could  she  want  to 
talk  to  him  about,  anyway  ?  The  minute  of  silence 
stretched  itself  out  upon  nis  nerves  into  an  inter- 

144 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

minable  period  of  anxious  unhappiness.  Her 
mention  of  the  doctor  at  last  somehow  seemed  to 
lighten  the  situation. 

"  Oh,  I  thought  he  was  very  smart,"  he  made 
haste  to  answer.  "  Would  n't  it  be  better  —  to  — 
keep  close  to  your  man  ?  He  —  may  —  think 
we  've  gone  some  other  way." 

"  It  would  n't  matter  if  he  did,"  remarked  Celia. 
She  appeared  to  comprehend  his  nervousness  and 
take  pity  on  it,  for  she  added,  "It  is  my  brother 
Michael,  as  good  a  soul  as  ever  lived.  He  is  quite 
used  to  my  ways." 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Ware  drew  a  long  comforting 
breath.  "  Oh,  I  see  !  He  went  with  you  to  — 
bring  you  home." 

"  To  blow  the  organ,"  said  the  girl  in  the  dark, 
correctingly.  "  But  about  that  doctor ;  did  you 
like  him  ?  " 

"  Well,"  Theron  began,  "  <  like  '  is  rather  a 
strong  word  for  so  short  an  acquaintance.  He 
talked  very  well ;  that  is,  fluently.  But  he  is  so 
different  from  any  other  man  I  have  come  into 
contact  with  that  —  " 

"  What  I  wanted  you  to  say  was  that  you  hated 
him,"  put  in  Celia,  firmly. 

"  I  don't  make  a  practice  of  saying  that  of  any 
body,"  returned  Theron,  so  much  at  his  ease  again 
that  he  put  an  effect  of  gentle,  smiling  reproof 
into  the  words.  "And  why  specially  should  I 
make  an  exception  for  him  ?  " 
10  T45 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  Because  he  's  a  beast !  " 

Theron  fancied  that  he  understood.  "  I  noticed 
that  he  seemed  not  to  have  much  of  an  ear  for 
music,"  he  commented,  with  a  little  laugh.  "  He 
shut  down  the  window  when  you  began  to  play. 
His  doing  so  annoyed  me,  because  I  —  I  wanted 
very  much  to  hear  it  all.  I  never  heard  such 
music  before.  I  —  I  came  into  the  church  to 
hear  more  of  it ;  but  then  you  stopped  !  " 

"  I  will  play  for  you  some  other  time,"  Celia 
said,  answering  the  reproach  in  his  tone.  "  But 
to-night  I  wanted  to  talk  with  you  instead." 

She  kept  silent,  in  spite  of  this,  so  long  now 
that  Theron  was  on  the  point  of  jestingly  asking 
when  the  talk  was  to  begin.  Then  she  put  a  ques 
tion  abruptly,  — 

"  It  is  a  conventional  way  of  putting  it,  but  are 
you  fond  of  poetry,  Mr.  Ware  ?  " 

"Well,  yes,  I  suppose  I  am,"  replied  Theron, 
much  mystified.  "  I  can't  say  that  I  am  any  great 
judge  ;  but  I  like  the  things  that  I  like  —  and  —  " 

"  Meredith,"  interposed  Celia,  "  makes  one  of 
his  women,  Emilia  in  England,  say  that  poetry  is 
like  talking  on  tiptoe ;  like  animals  in  cages, 
always  going  to  one  end  and  back  again.  Does  it 
impress  you  that  way?  " 

"  I  don't  know  that  it  does,"  said  he,  dubiously. 
It  seemed,  however,  to  be  her  whim  to  talk  liter 
ature,  and  he  went  on  :  "I  've  hardly  read  Mere 
dith  at  all.  I  once  borrowed  his  '  Lucile,'  but 

146 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

somehow  I  never  got  interested  in  it.  I  heard  a 
recitation  of  his  once,  though,  —  a  piece  about  a 
dead  wife,  and  the  husband  and  another  man  quar 
relling  as  to  whose  portrait  was  in  the  locket  on 
her  neck,  and  of  their  going  up  to  settle  the  dis 
pute,  and  finding  that  it  was  the  likeness  of  a  third 
man,  a  young  priest,  —  and  though  it  was  very 
striking,  it  did  n't  give  me  a  thirst  to  know  his 
other  poems.  I  fancied  I  should  n't  like  them. 
But  I  daresay  I  was  wrong.  As  I  get  older,  I  find 
that  I  take  less  narrow  views  of  literature,  —  that 
is,  of  course,  of  light  literature,  —  and  that  — 
that—" 

Celia  mercifully  stopped  him.  "  The  reason  I 
asked  you  was  — "  she  began,  and  then  herself 
paused.  "  Or  no,  —  never  mind  that,  —  tell  me 
something  else.  Are  you  fond  of  pictures,  statuary, 
the  beautiful  things  of  the  world?  Do  great 
works  of  art,  the  big  achievements  of  the  big 
artists,  appeal  to  you,  stir  you  up?" 

"  Alas  !  that  is  something  I  can  only  guess  at 
myself,"  answered  Theron,  humbly.  "  I  have  al 
ways  lived  in  little  places.  I  suppose,  from  your 
point  of  view,  I  have  never  seen  a  good  painting 
in  my  life.  I  can  only  say  this,  though,  —  that  it 
has  always  weighed  on  my  mind  as  a  great  and 
sore  deprivation,  this  being  shut  out  from  knowing 
what  others  mean  when  they  talk  and  write  about 
ait.  Perhaps  that  may  help  you  to  get  at  what 
you  are  after.  If  I  ever  went  to  New  York,  I  feel 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

that  one  of  the  first  things  I  should  do  would  be 
to  see  all  the  picture  galleries ;  is  that  what  you 
meant  ?  And  —  would  you  mind  telling  me  — 
why  you  — ?  " 

"  Why  I  asked  you?"  Celia  supplied  his  halt 
ing  question.  "  No,  I  don't  mind.  I  have  a 
reason  for  wanting  to  know  —  to  satisfy  myself 
whether  I  had  guessed  rightly  or  not  —  about  the 
kind  of  man  you  are.  I  mean  in  the  matter  of 
temperament  and  bent  of  mind  and  tastes." 

The  girl  seemed  to  be  speaking  seriously,  and 
without  intent  to  offend.  Theron  did  not  find  any 
comment  ready,  but  walked  along  by  her  side, 
wondering  much  what  it  was  all  about. 

"  I  daresay  you  think  me  '  too  familiar  on  short 
acquaintance,'"  she  continued,  after  a  little. 

"  My  dear  Miss  Madden  !  "  he  protested  per 
functorily. 

"  No ;  it  is  a  matter  of  a  good  deal  of  impor 
tance,"  she  went  on.  "  I  can  see  that  you  are 
going  to  be  thrown  into  friendship,  close  contact, 
with  Father  Forbes.  He  likes  you,  and  you  can't 
help  liking  him.  There  is  nobody  else  in  this  raw, 
overgrown,  empty-headed  place  for  you  and  him 
to  like,  —  nobody  except  that  man,  that  Dr.  Leds- 
mar.  And  if  you  like  him,  I  shall  hate  you  !  He 
has  done  mischief  enough  already.  I  am  count 
ing  on  you  to  help  undo  it,  and  to  choke  him  off 
from  doing  more.  It  would  be  different  if  you 
were  an  ordinary  Orthodox  minister,  all  encased 

148 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

like  a  terrapin  in  prejudices  and  nonsense.  Of 
course,  if  you  had  been  that  kind,  we  should  never 
have  got  to  know  you  at  all.  But  when  I  saw  you 
in  McEvoy's  cottage  there,  it  was  plain  that  you 
were  one  of  us,  —  I  mean  a  man,  and  not  a  mar 
ionette  or  a  mummy.  I  am  talking  very  frankly 
to  you,  you  see.  I  want  you  on  my  side,  against 
that  doctor  and  his  heartless,  bloodless  science." 

"  I  feel  myself  very  heartily  on  your  side," 
replied  Theron.  She  had  set  their  progress  at  a 
slower  pace,  now  that  the  lights  of  the  main  street 
were  drawing  near,  as  if  to  prolong  their  talk.  All 
his  earlier  reservations  had  fled.  It  was  almost  as 
if  she  were  a  parishioner  of  his  own.  "  I  need 
hardly  tell  you  that  the  doctor's  whole  attitude 
toward  —  toward  revelation  —  was  deeply  repug 
nant  to  me.  It  does  n't  make  it  any  the  less  hate 
ful  to  call  it  science.  I  am  afraid,  though,"  he  went 
on  hesitatingly,  "that  there  are  difficulties  in  the 
way  of  my  helping,  as  you  call  it.  You  see,  the 
very  fact  of  my  being  a  Methodist  minister,  and 
his  being  a  Catholic  priest,  rather  puts  my  interfer 
ence  out  of  the  question." 

"  No  ;  that  does  n't  matter  a  button,"  said  Celia, 
lightly.  "  None  of  us  think  of  that  at  all." 

"There  is  the  other  embarrassment,  then," 
pursued  Theron,  diffidently,  "that  Father  Forbes 
is  a  vastly  broader  and  deeper  scholar  —  in  all 
these  matters  —  than  I  am.  How  could  I  pos 
sibly  hope  to  influence  him  by  my  poor  argu- 

149 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ments?  I  don't  know  even  the  alphabet  of  the 
language  he  thinks  in,  —  on  these  subjects,  I 
mean." 

"Of  course  you  don't!"  interposed  the  girl, 
with  a  confidence  which  the  other,  for  all  his 
meekness,  rather  winced  under.  "  That  was  n't 
what  I  meant  at  all.  We  don't  want  arguments 
from  our  friends  :  we  want  sympathies,  sensibilities, 
emotional  bonds.  The  right  person's  silence  is 
worth  more  for  companionship  than  the  wisest 
talk  in  the  world  from  anybody  else.  It  isn't 
your  mind  that  is  needed  here,  or  what  you  know ; 
it  is  your  heart,  and  what  you  feel.  You  are  full 
of  poetry,  of  ideals,  of  generous,  unselfish  im 
pulses.  You  see  the  human,  the  warm-blooded 
side  of  things.  That  is  what  is  really  valuable. 
That  is  how  you  can  help  !  " 

"  You  overestimate  me  sadly,"  protested  Theron, 
though  with  considerable  tolerance  for  her  error  in 
his  tone.  "  But  you  ought  to  tell  me  something 
about  this  Dr.  Ledsmar.  He  spoke  of  being  an 
old  friend  of  the  pr  —  of  Father  Forbes." 

"  Oh,  yes,  they  've  always  known  each  other ;  that 
is,  for  many  years.  They  were  professors  together 
in  a  college  once,  heaven  only  knows  how  long 
ago.  Then  they  separated,  —  I  fancy  they  quar 
relled,  too,  before  they  parted.  The  doctor  came 
here,  where  some  relative  had  left  him  the  place 
he  lives  in.  Then  in  time  the  Bishop  chanced  to 
send  Father  Forbes  here,  —  that  was  about  three 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

years  ago,  —  and  the  two  men  after  a  while  renewed 
their  old  relations.  They  dine  together;  that  is 
the  doctor's  stronghold.  He  knows  more  about 
eating  than  any  other  man  alive,  I  believe.  He 
studies  it  as  you  would  study  a  language.  He 
has  taught  old  Maggie,  at  the  pastorate  there,  to 
cook  like  the  mother  of  all  the  Delmonicos.  And 
while  they  sit  and  stuff  themselves,  or  loll  about 
afterward  like  gorged  snakes,  they  think  it  is 
smart  to  laugh  at  all  the  sweet  and  beautiful  things 
in  life,  and  to  sneer  at  people  who  believe  in 
ideals,  and  to  talk  about  mankind  being  merely  a 
fortuitous  product  of  fermentation,  and  twaddle  of 
that  sort.  It  makes  me  sick  !  " 

"  I  can  readily  see,"  said  Theron,  with  sym 
pathy,  "  how  such  a  cold,  material,  and  infidel 
influence  as  that  must  shock  and  revolt  an  essen 
tially  religious  temperament  like  yours." 

Miss  Madden  looked  up  at  him.  They  had 
turned  into  the  main  street,  and  there  was  light 
enough  for  him  to  detect  something  startlingly  like 
a  grin  on  her  beautiful  face. 

"  But  I  'm  not  religious  at  all,  you  know,"  he 
heard  her  say.  "  I  'm  as  Pagan  as  —  anything  ! 
Of  course  there  are  forms  to  be  observed,  and  so 
on ;  I  rather  like  them  than  otherwise.  I  can 
make  them  serve  very  well  for  my  own  system  ; 
for  I  am  myself,  you  know,  an  out-an-out  Greek." 

"  Why,  I  had  supposed  that  you  were  full- 
blooded  Irish,"  the  Rev.  Mr.  Ware  found  himself 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

remarking,  and  then  on  the  instant  was  over 
whelmed  by  the  consciousness  that  he  had  said  a 
foolish  thing.  Precisely  where  the  folly  lay  he  did 
not  know,  but  it  was  impossible  to  mistake  the  ges 
ture  of  annoyance  which  his  companion  had  in 
stinctively  made  at  his  words.  She  had  widened 
the  distance  between  them  now,  and  quickened 
her  step.  They  went  on  in  silence  till  they  were 
within  a  block  of  her  house.  Several  people  had 
passed  them  who  Theron  felt  sure  must  have 
recognized  them  both. 

"  What  I  meant  was,"  the  girl  all  at  once  began, 
drawing  nearer  again,  and  speaking  with  patient 
slowness,  "  that  I  find  myself  much  more  in  sym 
pathy  with  the  Greek  thought,  the  Greek  theology 
of  the  beautiful  and  the  strong,  the  Greek  phil 
osophy  of  life,  and  all  that,  than  what  is  taught 
nowadays.  Personally,  I  take  much  more  stock  in 
Plato  than  I  do  in  Peter.  But  of  course  it  is  a 
wholly  personal  affair ;  I  had  no  business  to  bother 
you  with  it.  And  for  that  matter,  I  ought  n't  to 
have  troubled  you  with  any  of  our  —  " 

"I  assure  you,  Miss  Madden  !  "  the  young  min 
ister  began,  with  fervor. 

"  No,"  she  broke  in,  in  a  resigned  and  even 
downcast  tone  ;  "  let  it  all  be  as  if  I  had  n't  spoken. 
Don't  mind  anything  I  have  said.  If  it  is  to  be,  it 
will  be.  You  can't  say  more  than  that,  can  you?" 

She  looked  into  his  face  again,  and  her  large 
eyes  produced  an  impression  of  deep  melancholy, 

152 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

which  Theron  found  himself  somehow  impelled  to 
share.  Things  seemed  all  at  once  to  have  become 
very  sad  indeed. 

"  It  is  one  of  my  unhappy  nights,"  she  ex 
plained,  in  gloomy  confidence.  "  I  get  them 
every  once  in  a  while,  —  as  if  some  vicious  planet 
or  other  was  crossing  in  front  of  my  good  star, 
—  and  then  I  'm  a  caution  to  snakes.  I  shut  my 
self  up  —  that  's  the  only  thing  to  do  —  and  have 
it  out  with  myself.  I  did  n't  know  but  the  organ- 
music  would  calm  me  down,  but  it  hasn't.  I 
sha'n't  sleep  a  wink  to-night,  but  just  rage  around 
from  one  room  to  another,  piling  all  the  cushions 
from  the  divans  on  to  the  floor,  and  then  kicking 
them  away  again.  Do  you  ever  have  fits  like 
that?" 

Theron  was  able  to  reply  with  a  good  con 
science  in  the  negative.  It  occurred  to  him  to 
add,  with  jocose  intent :  "  I  am  curious  to  know, 
do  these  fits,  as  you  call  them,  occupy  a  prominent 
part  in  Grecian  philosophy  as  a  general  rule?  " 

Celia  gave  a  little  snort,  which  might  have  sig 
nified  amusement,  but  did  not  speak  until  they 
were  upon  her  own  sidewalk.  "  There  is  my 
brother,  waiting  at  the  gate,"  she  said  then,  briefly. 

"Well,  then,  I  will  bid  you  good-night  here,  I 
think,"  Theron  remarked,  coming  to  a  halt,  and 
offering  his  hand.  "  It  must  be  getting  very  late, 
and  my  —  that  is  —  I  have  to  be  up  particularly 
early  to-morrow.  So  good-night;  I  hope  you 

153 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

will  be  feeling  ever  so  much  better  in  spirits  in 
the  morning." 

"Oh,  that  doesn't  matter,"  replied  the  girl, 
listlessly.  "  It 's  a  very  paltry  little  affair,  this  life 
of  ours,  at  the  best  of  it.  Luckily  it 's  soon  done 
with,  —  like  a  bad  dream." 

"Tut !  tut !  I  won't  have  you  talk  like  that !  " 
interrupted  Theron,  with  a  swift  and  smart  assump 
tion  of  authority.  "  Such  talk  is  n't  sensible,  and 
it  isn't  good.  I  have  no  patience  with  it !  " 

"  Well,  try  and  have  a  little  patience  with  me, 
anyway,  just  for  to-night,"  said  Celia,  taking 
the  reproof  with  gentlest  humility,  rather  to  her 
censor's  surprise.  "  I  really  am  unhappy  to-night, 
Mr.  Ware,  very  unhappy.  It  seems  as  if  all  at 
once  the  world  had  swelled  out  in  size  a  thousand 
fold,  and  that  poor  me  had  dwindled  down  to  the 
merest  wee  little  red-headed  atom,  —  the  most 
helpless  and  forlorn  and  lonesome  of  atoms  at 
that."  She  seemed  to  force  a  sorrowful  smile  on 
her  face  as  she  added  :  "  But  all  the  same  it  has 
done  me  good  to  be  with  you,  —  I  am  sure  it  has, 

—  and  I  daresay  that  by  to-morrow  I  shall  be 
quite  out  of  the  blues.     Good-night,  Mr.  Ware. 
Forgive  my  making  such  an  exhibition  of  myself. 
I  was  going  to  be  such  a  fine  early  Greek,  you 
know,  and  I  have  turned  out  only  a  late  Milesian, 

—  quite   of  the    decadence.     I    shall    do    better 
next  time.     And  good-night  again,  —  and  ever  so 
many  thanks." 

154 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

She  was  walking  briskly  away  toward  the  gate 
now,  where  the  shadowy  Michael  still  patiently 
stood.  Theron  strode  off  in  the  opposite  direc 
tion,  taking  long,  deliberate  steps,  and  bowing  his 
head  in  thought.  He  had  his  hands  behind  his 
back,  as  was  his  wont,  and  the  sense  of  their 
recent  contact  with  her  firm,  ungloved  hands  was, 
curiously  enough,  the  thing  which  pushed  itself 
uppermost  in  his  mind.  There  had  been  a  frank, 
almost  manly  vigor  in  her  grasp ;  he  said  to  him 
self  that  of  course  that  came  from  her  playing  so 
much  on  the  keyboard ;  the  exercise  naturally 
would  give  her  large,  robust  hands. 

Suddenly  he  remembered  about  the  piano ;  he 
had  quite  forgotten  to  solicit  her  aid  in  selecting 
it.  He  turned,  upon  the  impulse,  to  go  back. 
She  had  not  entered  the  gate  as  yet,  but  stood, 
shiningly  visible  under  the  street  lamp,  on  the 
sidewalk,  and  she  was  looking  in  his  direction. 
He  turned  again  like  a  shot,  and  started  home 
ward. 

The  front  door  of  the  parsonage  was  unlocked, 
and  he  made  his  way  on  tiptoe  through  the  un- 
lighted  hall  to  the  living-room.  The  stuffy  air 
here  was  almost  suffocating  with  the  evil  smell  of  a 
kerosene  lamp  turned  down  too  low.  Alice  sat 
asleep  in  her  old  farmhouse  rocking-chair,  with  an 
inelegant  darning-basket  on  the  table  by  her  side. 
The  whole  effect  of  the  room  was  as  bare  and 
squalid  to  Theron's  newly  informed  eye  as  the 

'55 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

atmosphere  was  offensive  to  his  nostrils.  He 
coughed  sharply,  and  his  wife  sat  up  and  looked 
at  the  clock.  It  was  after  eleven. 

"Where  on  earth  have  you  been?"  she  asked, 
with  a  yawn,  turning  up  the  wick  of  her  sewing- 
lamp  again. 

"  You  ought  never  to  turn  down  a  light  like  that," 
said  Theron,  with  a  complaining  note  in  his  voice. 
"  It  smells  up  the  whole  place.  I  never  dreamed 
of  your  sitting  up  for  me  like  this.  You  ought  to 
have  gone  to  bed." 

"  But  how  could  I  guess  that  you  were  going  to 
be  so  late?"  she  retorted.  "And  you  haven't 
told  me  where  you  were.  Is  this  book  of  yours 
going  to  keep  you  up  like  this  right  along?" 

The  episode  of  the  book  was  buried  in  the 
young  minister's  mind  beneath  such  a  mass  of 
subsequent  experiences  that  it  required  an  effort 
for  him  to  grasp  what  she  was  talking  about.  It 
seemed  as  if  months  had  elapsed  since  he  was  in 
earnest  about  that  book ;  and  yet  he  had  left  the 
house  full  of  it  only  a  few  hours  before.  He  shook 
his  wits  together,  and  made  answer,  — 

"  Oh,  bless  you,  no  !  Only  there  arose  a  very 
curious  question.  You  have  no  idea,  literally  no 
conception,  of  the  interesting  and  important  prob 
lems  which  are  raised  by  the  mere  fact  of  Abraham 
leaving  the  city  of  Ur.  It 's  amazing,  I  assure 
you.  I  hadn't  realized  it  myself." 

"  Well,"    remarked   Alice,    rising,  —  and   with 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

good-humor  and  petulance  struggling  sleepily  in 
her  tone,  —  "all  I  Ve  got  to  say  is,  that  if  Abra 
ham  hasn't  anything  better  to  do  than  to  keep 
young  ministers  of  the  gospel  out,  goodness  knows 
where,  till  all  hours  of  the  night,  I  wish  to  gra 
cious  he  'd  stayed  in  the  city  of  Ur  right  straight 
along." 

"  You  have  no  idea  what  a  scholarly  man  Dr. 
Ledsmar  is,"  Theron  suddenly  found  himself  in 
spired  to  volunteer.  "  He  has  the  most  marvellous 
collection  of  books,  —  a  whole  library  devoted  to 
this  very  subject, — and  he  has  put  them  all  quite 
freely  at  my  disposal.  Extremely  kind  of  him, 
isn't  it?" 

"Ledsmar?  Ledsmar?"  queried  Alice.  "I 
don't  seem  to  remember  the  name.  He  isn't 
the  little  man  with  the  birthmark,  who  sits  in  the 
pew  behind  the  Lovejoys,  is  he?  I  think  some 
one  said  he  was  a  doctor." 

"Yes,  a  horse  doctor!"  said  Theron,  with  a 
sniff.  "  No ;  you  have  n't  seen  this  Dr.  Ledsmar 
at  all.  I  —  I  don't  know  that  he  attends  any 
church  regularly.  I  scraped  his  acquaintance  quite 
by  accident.  He  is  really  a  character.  He  lives 
in  the  big  house,  just  beyond  the  race-course,  you 
know  —  the  one  with  the  tower  at  the  back  —  " 

"No,  I  don't  know.  How  should  I?  I've 
hardly  poked  my  nose  outside  of  the  yard  since 
I  have  been  here." 

"Well,  you  shall  go,"   said  the  husband,  con- 

*57       * 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

solingly.  "  You  have  been  cooped  up  here  too 
much,  poor  girl.  I  must  take  you  out  more, 
really.  I  don't  know  that  I  could  take  you 
to  the  doctor's  place  —  without  an  invitation, 
I  mean.  He  is  very  queer  about  some  things. 
He  lives  there  all  alone,  for  instance,  with  only  a 
Chinaman  for  a  servant.  He  told  me  I  was  almost 
the  only  man  he  had  asked  under  his  roof  for 
years.  He  is  n't  a  practising  physician  at  all,  you 
know.  He  is  a  scientist ;  he  makes  experiments 
with  lizards  —  and  things." 

"Theron,"  the  wife  said,  pausing  lamp  in  hand 
on  her  way  to  the  bedroom,  "  do  you  be  careful, 
now  !  For  all  you  know  this  doctor  may  be  a 
loose  man,  or  pretty  near  an  infidel.  You  Ve  got 
to  be  mighty  particular  in  such  matters,  you  know, 
or  you  '11  have  the  trustees  down  on  you  like  a 
'  thousand  of  bricks.'  " 

"  I  will  thank  the  trustees  to  mind  their  own 
business,"  said  Theron,  stiffly,  and  the  subject 
dropped. 

The  bedroom  window  upstairs  was  open,  and 
upon  the  fresh  night  air  was  borne  in  the  shrill, 
jangling  sound  of  a  piano,  being  played  off  some 
where  in  the  distance,  but  so  vehemently  that  the 
noise  imposed  itself  upon  the  silence  far  and  wide. 
Theron  listened  to  this  as  he  undressed.  It  pro 
ceeded  from  the  direction  of  the  main  street,  and 
he  knew,  as  by  instinct,  that  it  was  the  Madden 
girl  who  was  playing.  The  incongruity  of  the  hour 

158 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

escaped  his  notice.  He  mused  instead  upon  the  wild 
and  tropical  tangle  of  moods,  emotions,  passions, 
which  had  grown  up  in  that  strange  temperament. 
He  found  something  very  pathetic  in  that  picture 
she  had  drawn  of  herself  in  forecast,  roaming  dis 
consolate  through  her  rooms  the  livelong  night, 
unable  to  sleep.  The  woful  moan  of  insomnia 
seemed  to  make  itself  heard  in  every  strain  from 
her  piano. 

Alice  heard  it  also,  but  being  unillumined,  she 
missed  the  romantic  pathos.  "  I  call  it  disgrace 
ful,"  she  muttered  from  her  pillow,  "for  folks  to 
be  banging  away  on  a  piano  at  this  time  of  night. 
There  ought  to  be  a  law  to  prevent  it." 

"It  may  be  some  distressed  soul,"  said  The- 
ron,  gently,  "  seeking  relief  from  the  curse  of 
sleeplessness." 

The  wife  laughed,  almost  contemptuously. 
"  Distressed  fiddlesticks ! "  was  her  only  other 
comment. 

The  music  went  on  for  a  long  time,  —  rising 
now  to  strident  heights,  now  sinking  off  to  the 
merest  tinkling  murmur,  and  broken  ever  and 
again  by  intervals  of  utter  hush.  It  did  not  pre 
vent  Alice  from  at  once  falling  sound  asleep ;  but 
Theron  lay  awake,  it  seemed  to  him,  for  hours, 
listening  tranquilly,  and  letting  his  mind  wander  at 
will  through  the  pleasant  antechambers  of  Sleep, 
where  are  more  unreal  fantasies  than  Dreamland 
itself  affords. 

159 


PART   II 


CHAPTER   XI 

FOR  some  weeks  the  Rev.  Theron  Ware  saw 
nothing  of  either  the  priest  or  the  doctor,  or  the 
interesting  Miss  Madden. 

There  were,  indeed,  more  urgent  matters  to 
think  about.  June  had  come ;  and  every  suc 
ceeding  day  brought  closer  to  hand  the  ordeal  of 
his  first  Quarterly  Conference  in  Octavius.  The 
waters  grew  distinctly  rougher  as  his  pastoral  bark 
neared  this  difficult  passage. 

He  would  have  approached  the  great  event  with 
an  easier  mind  if  he  could  have  made  out  just  how 
he  stood  with  his  congregation.  Unfortunately 
nothing  in  his  previous  experiences  helped  him  in 
the  least  to  measure  or  guess  at  the  feelings  of 
these  curious  Octavians.  Their  Methodism  seemed 
to  be  sound  enough,  and  to  stick  quite  to  the  letter 
of  the  Discipline,  so  long  as  it  was  expressed  in 
formulae.  It  was  its  spirit  which  he  felt  to  be 
complicated  by  all  sorts  of  conditions  wholly  novel 
to  him. 

The  existence  of  a  line  of  street- cars  in  the 
town,  for  example,  would  not  impress  the  casual 

160 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

thinker  as  likely  to  prove  a  rock  in  the  path  of 
peaceful  religion.  Theron,  in  his  simplicity,  had 
even  thought,  when  he  first  saw  these  bobtailed 
cars  bumping  along  the  rails  in  the  middle  of  the 
main  street,  that  they  must  be  a  great  convenience 
to  people  living  in  the  outskirts,  who  wished  to 
get  in  to  church  of  a  Sunday  morning.  He  was 
imprudent  enough  to  mention  this  in  conversation 
with  one  of  his  new  parishioners.  Then  he  learned, 
to  his  considerable  chagrin,  that  when  this  line  was 
built,  some  years  before,  a  bitter  war  of  words  had 
been  fought  upon  the  question  of  its  being  worked 
on  the  Sabbath  day.  The  then  occupant  of  the 
Methodist  pulpit  had  so  distinguished  himself  above 
the  rest  by  the  solemnity  and  fervor  of  his  protests 
against  this  insolent  desecration  of  God's  day  that 
the  Methodists  of  Octavius  still  felt  themselves 
peculiarly  bound  to  hold  this  horse-car  line,  its 
management,  and  everything  connected  with  it,  in 
unbending  aversion.  At  least  once  a  year  they 
were  accustomed  to  expect  a  sermon  denouncing 
it  and  all  its  impious  Sunday  patrons.  Theron 
made  a  mental  resolve  that  this  year  they  should 
be  disappointed. 

Another  burning  problem,  which  he  had  not 
been  called  upon  before  to  confront,  he  found 
now  entangled  with  the  mysterious  line  which 
divided  a  circus  from  a  menagerie.  Those  itiner 
ant  tent-shows  had  never  come  his  way  heretofore, 
and  he  knew  nothing  of  that  fine  balancing  pro- 
n  161 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

portion  between  ladies  in  tights  on  horseback  and 
cages  full  of  deeply  educational  animals,  which, 
even  as  the  impartial  rain,  was  designed  to  em 
brace  alike  the  just  and  the  unjust.  There  had 
arisen  inside  the  Methodist  society  of  Octavius 
some  painful  episodes,  connected  with  members 
who  took  their  children  "just  to  see  the  animals," 
and  were  convicted  of  having  also  watched  the 
Rose- Queen  of  the  Arena,  in  her  unequalled  flying 
leap  through  eight  hoops,  with  an  ardent  and  un 
ashamed  eye.  One  of  these  cases  still  remained  on 
the  censorial  docket  of  the  church ;  and  Theron 
understood  that  he  was  expected  to  name  a  com 
mittee  of  five  to  examine  and  try  it.  This  he 
neglected  to  do. 

He  was  no  longer  at  all  certain  that  the  con 
gregation  as  a  whole  liked  his  sermons.  The 
truth  was,  no  doubt,  that  he  had  learned  enough 
to  cease  regarding  the  congregation  as  a  whole. 
He  could  still  rely  upon  carrying  along  with  him 
in  his  discourses  from  the  pulpit  a  large  majority 
of  interested  and  approving  faces.  But  here, 
unhappily,  was  a  case  where  the  majority  did  not 
rule.  The  minority,  relatively  small  in  numbers, 
was  prodigious  in  virile  force. 

More  than  twenty  years  had  now  elapsed  since 
that  minor  schism  in  the  Methodist  Episcopal 
Church,  the  result  of  which  was  the  independent 
body  known  as  Free  Methodists,  had  relieved  the 
parent  flock  of  its  principal  disturbing  element. 

162 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

The  rupture  came  fittingly  at  that  time  when 
all  the  "  isms "  of  the  argumentative  fifties  were 
hurled  violently  together  into  the  melting-pot  of 
civil  war.  The  great  Methodist  Church,  South, 
had  broken  bodily  off  on  the  question  of  State 
Rights.  The  smaller  and  domestic  fraction  of 
Free  Methodism  separated  itself  upon  an  issue 
which  may  be  most  readily  described  as  one  of 
civilization.  The  seceders  resented  growth  in 
material  prosperity;  they  repudiated  the  intro 
duction  of  written  sermons  and  organ-music ; 
they  deplored  the  increasing  laxity  in  meddle 
some  piety,  the  introduction  of  polite  manners 
in  the  pulpit  and  class-room,  and  the  develop 
ment  of  even  a  rudimentary  desire  among  the 
younger  people  of  the  church  to  be  like  others 
outside  in  dress  and  speech  and  deportment. 
They  did  battle  as  long  as  they  could,  inside  the 
fold,  to  restore  it  to  the  severely  straight  and  narrow 
path  of  primitive  Methodism.  When  the  adverse 
odds  became  too  strong  for  them,  they  quitted  the 
church  and  set  up  a  Bethel  for  themselves. 

Octavius  chanced  to  be  one  of  the  places  where 
they  were  able  to  hold  their  own  within  the  church 
organization.  The  Methodism  of  the  town  had 
gone  along  without  any  local  secession.  It  still 
held  in  full  fellowship  the  radicals  who  elsewhere 
had  followed  their  unbridled  bent  into  the  strong 
est  emotional  vagaries,  —  where  excited  brethren 
worked  themselves  up  into  epileptic  fits,  and 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

women  whirled  themselves  about  in  weird  re 
ligious  ecstasies,  like  dervishes  of  the  Orient,  till 
they  fell  headlong  in  a  state  of  trance.  Octavian 
Methodism  was  spared  extravagances  of  this  sort, 
it  is  true,  but  it  paid  a  price  for  the  immunity. 
The  people  whom  an  open  split  would  have  taken 
away  remained  to  leaven  and  dominate  the  whole 
lump.  This  small  advanced  section,  with  its  men 
of  a  type  all  the  more  aggressive  from  its  narrow 
ness,  and  women  who  went  about  solemnly  in  plain 
gray  garments,  with  tight-fitting,  unadorned,  mouse- 
colored  sunbonnets,  had  not  been  able  wholly  to 
enforce  its  views  upon  the  social  life  of  the  church 
members,  but  of  its  controlling  influence  upon  their 
official  and  public  actions  there  could  be  no  doubt. 

The  situation  had  begun  to  unfold  itself  to 
Theron  from  the  outset.  He  had  recognized  the 
episodes  of  the  forbidden  Sunday  milk  and  of  the 
flowers  in  poor  Alice's  bonnet  as  typical  of  much 
more  that  was  to  come.  No  week  followed  without 
bringing  some  new  fulfilment  of  this  foreboding. 
Now,  at  the  end  of  two  months,  he  knew  well 
enough  that  the  hitherto  dominant  minority  was 
hostile  to  him  and  his  ministry,  and  would  do 
whatever  it  could  against  him. 

Though  Theron  at  once  decided  to  show  fight, 
and  did  not  at  all  waver  in  that  resolve,  his 
courage  was  in  the  main  of  a  despondent  sort. 
Sometimes  it  would  flutter  up  to  the  point  of 
confidence,  or  at  least  hopefulness,  when  he  met 

164 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

with  substantial  men  of  the  church  who  obviously 
liked  him,  and  whom  he  found  himself  mentally 
ranging  on  his  side,  in  the  struggle  which  was  to 
come.  But  more  often*  it  was  blankly  apparent 
to  him  that,  the  moment  flags  were  flying  and 
drums  on  the  roll,  these  amiable  fair-weather 
friends  would  probably  take  to  their  heels. 

Still,  such  as  they  were,  his  sole  hope  lay  in 
their  support.  He  must  make  the  best  of  them. 
He  set  himself  doggedly  to  the  task  of  gathering 
together  all  those  who  were  not  his  enemies  into 
what,  when  the  proper  time  came,  should  be 
known  as  the  pastor's  party.  There  was  plenty 
of  apostolic  warrant  for  this.  If  there  had  not 
been,  Theron  felt  that  the  mere  elementary  de 
mands  of  self-defence  would  have  justified  his 
use  of  strategy. 

The  institution  of  pastoral  calling,  particularly 
that  inquisitorial  form  of  it  laid  down  in  the  Dis 
cipline,  had  never  attracted  Theron.  He  and 
Alice  had  gone  about  among  their  previous  flocks 
in  quite  a  haphazard  fashion,  without  thought  of 
system,  much  less  of  deliberate  purpose.  Theron 
made  lists  now,  and  devoted  thought  and  exami 
nation  to  the  personal  tastes  and  characteristics  of 
the  people  to  be  cultivated.  There  were  some,  for 
example,  who  would  expect  him  to  talk  pretty  much 
as  the  Discipline  ordained,  —  that  is,  to  ask  if  they 
had  family  prayer,  to  inquire  after  their  souls,  and 
generally  to  minister  grace  to  his  hearers,  —  and 

165 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

these  in  turn  subdivided  themselves  into  classes, 
ranging  from  those  who  would  wish  nothing  else 
to  those  who  needed  only  a  mild  spiritual  flavor. 
There  were  others  whom  he  would  please  much 
better  by  not  talking  shop  at  all.  Although  he 
could  ill  afford  it,  he  subscribed  now  for  a  daily 
paper  that  he  might  have  a  perpetually  renewed 
source  of  good  conversational  topics  for  these 
more  worldly  calls.  He  also  bought  several 
pounds  of  candy,  pleasing  in  color,  but  warranted 
to  be  entirely  harmless,  and  he  made  a  large 
mysterious  mark  on  the  inside  of  his  new  silk  hat 
to  remind  him  not  to  go  out  calling  without  some 
of  this  in  his  pocket  for  the  children. 

Alice,  he  felt,  was  not  helping  him  in  this  mat 
ter  as  effectively  as  he  could  have  wished.  Her 
attitude  toward  the  church  in  Octavius  might  best 
be  described  by  the  word  "  sulky."  Great  allow 
ance  was  to  be  made,  he  realized,  for  her  humilia 
tion  over  the  flowers  in  her  bonnet.  That  might 
justify  her,  fairly  enough,  in  being  kept  away  from 
meeting  now  and  again  by  headaches,  or  unde 
fined  megrims.  But  it  ought  not  to  prevent  her 
from  going  about  and  making  friends  among  the 
kindlier  parishioners  who  would  welcome  such  a 
thing,  and  whom  he  from  time  to  time  indicated  to 
her.  She  did  go  to  some  extent,  it  is  true,  but  she 
produced,  in  doing  so,  an  effect  of  performing  a 
duty.  He  did  not  find  traces  anywhere  of  her 
having  created  a  brilliant  social  impression.  When 

166 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

they  went  out  together,  he  was  peculiarly  conscious 
of  having  to  do  the  work  unaided. 

This  was  not  at  all  like  the  Alice  of  former  years, 
of  other  charges.  Why,  she  had  been,  beyond  com 
parison,  the  most  popular  young  woman  in  Tyre. 
What  possessed  her  to  mope  like  this  in  Octavius  ? 

Theron  looked  at  her  attentively  nowadays,  when 
she  was  unaware  of  his  gaze,  to  try  if  her  face 
offered  any  answer  to  the  riddle.  It  could  not 
be  suggested  that  she  was  ill.  Never  in  her  life 
had  she  been  looking  so  well.  She  had  thrown 
herself,  all  at  once,  and  with  what  was  to  him  an 
unaccountable  energy,  into  the  creation  and  man 
agement  of  a  flower-garden.  She  was  out  the 
better  part  of  every  day,  rain  or  shine,  digging, 
transplanting,  pruning,  pottering  generally  about 
among  her  plants  and  shrubs.  This  work  in  the 
open  air  had  given  her  an  aspect  of  physical  well- 
being  which  it.  was  impossible  to  be  mistaken  about. 

Her  husband  was  glad,  of  course,  that  she  had 
found  some  occupation  which  at  once  pleased  her 
and  so  obviously  conduced  to  health.  This  was  so 
much  a  matter  of  course,  in  fact,  that  he  said  to 
himself  over  and  over  again  that  he  was  glad. 
Only  —  only,  sometimes  the  thought  would  force 
itself  upon  his  attention  that  if  she  did  not  spend 
so  much  of  her  time  in  her  own  garden,  she  would 
have  more  time  to  devote  to  winning  friends  for 
them  in  the  Garden  of  the  Lord,  —  friends  whom 
they  were  going  to  need  badly. 

167 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

The  young  minister,  in  taking  anxious  stock  of 
the  chances  for  and  against  him,  turned  over  often 
in  his  mind  the  fact  that  he  had  already  won  rank 
as  a  pulpit  orator.  His  sermons  had  attracted  al 
most  universal  attention  at  Tyre,  and  his  achieve 
ment  before  the  Conference  at  Tecumseh,  if  it  did 
fail  to  receive  practical  reward,  had  admittedly  dis 
tanced  all  the  other  preaching  there.  It  was  a  part 
of  the  evil  luck  pursuing  him  that  here  in  this  per 
versely  enigmatic  Octavius  his  special  gift  seemed 
to  be  of  no  use  whatever.  There  were  times, 
indeed,  when  he  was  tempted  to  think  that  bad 
preaching  was  what  Octavius  wanted. 

Somewhere  he  had  heard  of  a  Presbyterian 
minister,  in  charge  of  a  big  city  church,  who  man 
aged  to  keep  well  in  with  a  watchfully  Orthodox 
congregation,  and  at  the  same  time  establish  him 
self  in  the  affections  of  the  community  at  large,  by 
simply  preaching  two  kinds  of  sermons.  In  the 
morning,  when  almost  all  who  attended  were  his 
own  communicants,  he  gave  them  very  cautious 
and  edifying  doctrinal  discourses,  treading  loyally 
in  the  path  of  the  Westminster  Confession.  To 
the  evening  assemblages,  made  up  for  the  larger 
part  of  outsiders,  he  addressed  broadly  liberal 
sermons,  literary  in  form,  and  full  of  respectful 
allusions  to  modern  science  and  the  philosophy  of 
the  day.  Thus  he  filled  the  church  at  both  ser 
vices,  and  put  money  in  its  treasury  and  his  own 
fame  before  the  world.  There  was  of  course  the 

168 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

obvious  danger  that  the  pious  elders  who  in  the 
forenoon  heard  infant  damnation  vigorously  pro 
claimed,  would  revolt  when  they  heard  after  sup 
per  that  there  was  some  doubt  about  even  adults 
being  damned  at  all.  But  either  because  the 
same  people  did  not  attend  both  services,  or  be 
cause  the  minister's  perfect  regularity  in  the  morn 
ing  was  each  week  regarded  as  a  retraction  of  his 
latest  vagaries  of  an  evening,  no  trouble  ever  came. 

Theron  had  somewhat  tentatively  tried  this  on  in 
Octavius.  It  was  no  good.  His  parishioners  were 
of  the  sort  who  would  have  come  to  church  eight 
times  a  day  on  Sunday,  instead  of  two,  if  occasion  of 
fered.  The  hope  that  even  a  portion  of  them  would 
stop  away,  and  that  their  places  would  be  taken  in 
the  evening  by  less  prejudiced  strangers  who  wished 
for  intellectual  rather  than  theological  food,  fell  by 
the  wayside.  The  yearned-for  strangers  did  not 
come  ;  the  familiar  faces  of  the  morning  service  all 
turned  up  in  their  accustomed  places  every  evening. 
They  were  faces  which  confused  and  disheartened 
Theron  in  the  daytime.  Under  the  gaslight  they 
seemed  even  harder  and  more  unsympathetic.  He 
timorously  experimented  with  them  for  an  evening 
or  two,  then  abandoned  the  effort. 

Once  there  had  seemed  the  beginning  of  a  chance. 
The  richest  banker  in  Octavius  —  a  fat,  sensual, 
hog- faced  old  bachelor  —  surprised  everybody  one 
evening  by  entering  the  church  and  taking  a  seat. 
Theron  happened  to  know  who  he  was ;  even  if  he 

169 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

had  not  known,  the  suppressed  excitement  visible 
in  the  congregation,  the  way  the  sisters  turned  round 
to  look,  the  way  the  more  important  brethren  put 
their  heads  together  and  exchanged  furtive  whis 
pers,  —  would  have  warned  him  that  big  game  was 
in  view.  He  recalled  afterward  with  something  like 
self-disgust  the  eager,  almost  tremulous  pains  he 
himself  took  to  please  this  banker.  There  was  a 
part  of  the  sermon,  as  it  had  been  written  out, 
which  might  easily  give  offence  to  a  single  man  of 
wealth  and  free  notions  of  life.  With  the  alertness 
of  a  mental  gymnast,  Theron  ran  ahead,  excised 
this  portion,  and  had  ready  when  the  gap  was 
reached  some  very  pretty  general  remarks,  all  the 
more  effective  and  eloquent,  he  felt,  for  having  been 
extemporized.  People  said  it  was  a  good  sermon ; 
and  after  the  benediction  and  dispersion  some  of 
the  officials  and  principal  pew-holders  remained  to 
talk  over  the  likelihood  of  a  capture  having  been 
effected.  Theron  did  not  get  away  without  having 
this  mentioned  to  him,  and  he  was  conscious  of 
sharing  deeply  the  hope  of  the  brethren,  —  with  the 
added  reflection  that  it  would  be  a  personal  triumph 
for  himself  into  the  bargain.  He  was  ashamed  of 
this  feeling  a  little  later,  and  of  his  trick  with  the 
sermon.  But  this  chastening  product  of  introspec 
tion  was  all  the  fruit  which  the  incident  bore.  The 
banker  never  came  again. 

Theron  returned  one  afternoon,  a  little  earlier 
than  usual,  from  a  group  of  pastoral  calls.     Alice, 

170 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

who  was  plucking  weeds  in  a  border  at  the  shady 
side  of  the  house,  heard  his  step,  and  rose  from 
her  labors.  He  was  walking  slowly,  and  seemed 
weary.  He  took  off  his  high  hat,  as  he  saw  her, 
and  wiped  his  brow.  The  broiling  June  sun  was 
still  high  overhead.  Doubtless  it  was  its  insufferable 
heat  which  was  accountable  for  the  worn  lines  in 
his  face  and  the  spiritless  air  which  the  wife's  eye 
detected.  She  went  to  the  gate,  and  kissed  him  as 
he  entered. 

"  I  believe,  if  I  were  you,"  she  said,  "  I  'd  carry 
an  umbrella  such  scorching  days  as  this.  Nobody  'd 
think  anything  of  it.  I  don't  see  why  a  minister 
should  n't  carry  one  as  much  as  a  woman  carries  a 
parasol." 

Theron  gave  her  a  rueful,  meditative  sort  of 
smile.  "  I  suppose  people  really  do  think  of  us  as 
a  kind  of  hybrid  female,"  he  remarked.  Then, 
holding  his  hat  in  his  hand,  he  drew  a  long  breath  of 
relief  at  finding  himself  in  the  shade,  and  looked 
about  him. 

"  Why,  you  've  got  more  posies  here,  on  this  one 
side  of  the  house  alone,  than  mother  had  in  her  whole 
yard,"  he  said,  after  a  little.  "  Let 's  see  —  I  know 
that  one  :  that 's  columbine,  isn't  it?  And  that's 
London  pride,  and  that 's  ragged  robin.  I  don't 
know  any  of  the  others." 

Alice  recited  various  unfamiliar  names,  as  she 
pointed  out  the  several  plants  which  bore  them, 
and  he  listened  with  a  kindly  semblance  of  interest. 

171 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

They  strolled  thus  to  the  rear  of  the  house,  where 
thick  clumps  of  fragrant  pinks  lined  both  sides  of 
the  path.  She  picked  some  of  these  for  him,  and 
gave  him  more  names  with  which  to  label  the  con 
siderable  number  of  other  plants  he  saw  about  him. 

"  I  had  no  idea  we  were  so  well  provided  as  all 
this,"  he  commented  at  last.  "Those  Van  Sizers 
must  have  been  tremendous  hands  for  flowers. 
You  were  lucky  in  following  such  people." 

"  Van  Sizers  !  "  echoed  Alice,  with  contempt. 
"  All  they  left  was  old  tomato  cans  and  clamshells. 
Why,  I  Ve  put  in  every  blessed  one  of  these  myself, 
all  except  those  peonies,  there,  and  one  brier  on  the 
side  wall." 

"  Good  for  you  !  "  exclaimed  Theron,  approv 
ingly.  Then  it  occurred  to  him  to  ask,  "  But 
where  did  you  get  them  all  ?  Around  among  our 
friends  ?  " 

"  Some  few,"  responded  Alice,  with  a  note  of 
hesitation  in  her  voice.  "  Sister  Bult  gave  me  the 
verbenas,  there,  and  the  white  pinks  were  a  present 
from  Miss  Stevens.  But  most  of  them  Levi  Gor- 
ringe  was  good  enough  to  send  me,  —  from  his 
garden." 

"I  didn't  know  that  Gorringe  had  a  garden," 
said  Theron.  "  I  thought  he  lived  over  his  law- 
office,  in  the  brick  block,  there." 

"Well,  I  don't  know  that  it's  exactly  his"  ex 
plained  Alice  ;  "  but  it 's  a  big  garden  somewhere 
outside,  where  he  can  have  anything  he  likes." 

172 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

She  went  on  with  a  little  laugh  :  "  I  did  n't  like  to 
question  him  too  closely,  for  fear  he  'd  think  I  was 
looking  a  gift  horse  in  the  mouth,  —  or  else  hinting 
for  more.  It  was  quite  his  own  offer,  you  know. 
He  picked  them  all  out  for  me,  and  brought  them 
here,  and  lent  me  a  book  telling  me  just  what  to  do 
with  each  one.  And  in  a  few  days,  now,  I  am  to 
have  another  big  batch  of  plants,  —  dahlias  and 
zinnias  and  asters  and  so  on ;  I  'rn  almost  ashamed 
to  take  them.  But  it 's  such  a  change  to  find  some 
one  in  this  Octavius  who  is  n't  all  self !  " 

"Yes,  Gorringe  is  a  good  fellow,"  said  Theron. 
"  I  wish  he  was  a  professing  member."  Then 
some  new  thought  struck  him.  "  Alice,"  he  ex 
claimed,  "  I  believe  I  '11  go  and  see  him  this  very 
afternoon.  I  don't  know  why  it  has  n't  occurred 
to  me  before  :  he  's  just  the  man  whose  advice  I 
need  most.  He  knows  these  people  here ;  he 
can  tell  me  what  to  do." 

"Aren't  you  too  tired  now?"  suggested  Alice, 
as  Theron  put  on  his  hat. 

"  No,  the  sooner  the  better,"  he  replied,  moving 
now  toward  the  gate. 

"  Well,"  she  began,  "  if  I  were  you,  I  would  n't 
say  too  much  about  —  that  is,  I  —  but  never  mind." 

"  What  is  it?  "   asked  her  husband. 

"  Nothing  whatever,"  replied  Alice,  positively. 
"  It  was  only  some  nonsense  of  mine ; "  and 
Theron,  placidly  accepting  the  feminine  whim, 
went  off  down  the  street  again. 

173 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE  Rev.  Mr.  Ware  found  Levi  Gorringe's  law- 
office  readily  enough,  but  its  owner  was  not  in. 
He  probably  would  be  back  again,  though,  in  a 
quarter  of  an  hour  or  so,  the  boy  said,  and  the 
minister  at  once  decided  to  wait. 

Theron  was  interested  in  finding  that  this  office- 
boy  was  no  other  than  Harvey.  —  the  lad  who 
brought  milk  to  the  parsonage  every  morning . 
He  remembered  now  that  he  had  heard  good  things 
of  this  urchin,  as  to  the  hard  work  he  did  to  help 
his  mother,  the  Widow  Semple,  in  her  struggle  to 
keep  a  roof  over  her  head ;  and  also  bad  things,  in 
that  he  did  not  come  regularly  either  to  church  or 
Sunday-school.  The  clergyman  recalled,  too,  that 
Harvey  had  impressed  him  as  a  character. 

"Well,  sonny,  are  you  going  to  be  a  lawyer?  " 
he  asked,  as  he  seated  himself  by  the  window,  and 
looked  about  him,  first  at  the  dusty  litter  of  old 
papers,  pamphlets,  and  tape-bound  documents  in 
bundles  which  crowded  the  stuffy  chamber,  and 
then  at  the  boy  himself. 

Harvey  was  busy  at  a.  big  box,  —  a  rough  pine 
dry-goods  box  which  bore  the  flaring  label  of  an 
express  company,  and  also  of  a  well-known  seed- 

174 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

firm  in  a  Western  city,  and  which  the  boy  had 
apparently  just  opened.  He  was  lifting  from  it, 
and  placing  on  the  table  after  he  had  shaken  off 
the  sawdust  and  moss  in  which  they  were  packed, 
small  parcels  of  what  looked  in  the  fading  light 
to  be  half-dried  plants. 

"  Well,  I  don't  know  —  I  rather  guess  not,"  he 
made  answer,  as  he  pursued  his  task.  "  So  far  as 
I  can  make  out,  this  would  n't  be  the  place  to 
start  in  at,  if  I  was  going  to  be  a  lawyer.  A  boy 
can  learn  here  first-rate  how  to  load  cartridges 
and  clean  a  gun,  and  braid  trout- flies  on  to  leaders, 
but  I  don't  see  much  law  laying  around  loose. 
Anyway,"  he  went  on,  "  I  could  n't  afford  to  read 
law,  and  not  be  getting  any  wages.  I  have  to 
earn  money,  you  know." 

Theron  felt  that  he  liked  the  boy.  "Yes,"  he 
said,  with  a  kindly  tone ;  "  I  've  heard  that  you  are 
a  good,  industrious  youngster.  I  daresay  Mr.  Gor- 
ringe  will  see  to  it  that  you  get  a  chance  to  read 
law,  and  get  wages  too." 

"  Oh,  I  can  read  all  there  is  here  and  welcome," 
the  boy  explained,  stepping  toward  the  window  to 
decipher  the  label  on  a  bundle  of  roots  in  his  hand, 
"  but  that 's  no  good  unless  there  's  regular  prac 
tice  coming  into  the  office  all  the  while.  That's 
how  you  learn  to  be  a  lawyer.  But  Gorringe  don't 
have  what  I  call  a  practice  at  all.  He  just  sees 
men  in  the  other  room  there,  with  the  door  shut, 
and  whatever  there  is  to  do  he  does  it  all  himself." 

175 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

The  minister  remembered  a  stray  hint  some 
where  that  Mr.  Gorringe  was  a  money-lender, 
—  what  was  colloquially  called  a  "note-shaver." 
To  his  rustic  sense,  there  was  something  not 
quite  nice  about  that  occupation.  It  would 
be  indecorous,  he  felt,  to  encourage  further  talk 
about  it  from  the  boy. 

"  What  are  you  doing  there?"  he  inquired,  to 
change  the  subject. 

"  Sorting  out  some  plants,"  replied  Harvey.  "  I 
don't  know  what 's  got  into  Gorringe  lately.  This  is 
the  third  big  box  he  's  had  since  I  've  been  here,  — 
that  is,  in  six  weeks,  — :  besides  two  baskets  full  of 
rose-bushes.  I  don't  know  what  he  does  with  them. 
He  carries  them  off  himself  somewhere.  I  Ve 
had  kind  of  half  a  notion  that  he  's  figurin'  on  get 
ting  married.  I  can't  think  of  anything  else  that 
would  make  a  man  spend  money  like  water, — just 
for  flowers  and  bushes.  They  do  get  foolish,  you 
know,  when  they  Ve  got  marriage  on  the  brain." 

Theron  found  himself  only  imperfectly  following 
the  theories  of  the  young  philosopher.  It  was  his 
fact  that  monopolized  the  minister's  attention. 

"  But  as  I  understand  it,"  he  remarked  hesita 
tingly,  "Brother  Gorringe  —  or  rather  Mr.  Gor 
ringe —  gets  all  the  plants  he  wants,  everything 
he  likes,  from  a  big  garden  somewhere  outside.  I 
don't  know  that  it  is  exactly  his  ;  but  I  remember 
hearing  something  to  that  effect." 

The  boy  slapped  the  last  sawdust  off  his  hands, 

176 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and,  as  he  came  to  the  window,  shook  his  head. 
"  These  don't  come  from  no  garden  outside,"  he 
declared.  "  They  come  from  the  dealers',  and  he 
pays  solid  cash  for  'em.  The  invoice  for  this  lot 
alone  was  thirty-one  dollars  and  sixty  cents. 
There  it  is  on  the  table.  You  can  see  it  for 
yourself." 

Mr.  Ware  did  not  offer  to  look.  "  Very  likely 
these  are  for  the  garden  I  was  speaking  of,"  he 
said.  "  Of  course  you  can't  go  on  taking  plants 
out  of  a  garden  indefinitely  without  putting 
others  in." 

"  I  don't  know  anything  about  any  garden  that 
he  takes  plants  out  of,"  answered  Harvey,  and 
looked  meditatively  for  a  minute  or  two  out  upon 
the  street  below.  Then  he  turned  to  the  minis 
ter.  "  Your  wife  's  doing  a  good  deal  of  gardening 
this  spring,  I  notice,"  he  said  casually.  "  You  'd 
hardly  think  it  was  the  same  place,  she  's  fixed  it 
up  so.  If  she  wants  any  extra  hoeing  done,  I  can 
always  get  off  Saturday  afternoons." 

"  I  will  remember,"  said  Theron.  He  also 
looked  out  of  the  window ;  and  nothing  more  was 
said  until,  a  few  moments  later,  Mr.  Gorringe  him 
self  came  in. 

The  lawyer  seemed  both  surprised  and  pleased 
at  discovering  the  identity  of  his  visitor,  with  whom 
he  shook  hands  in  almost  an  excess  of  cordiality. 
He  spread  a  large  newspaper  over  the  pile  of  seed 
ling  plants  on  the  table,  pushed  the  packing- box 
J2  177 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

under  the  table  with  his  foot,  and  said  almost  per 
emptorily  to  the  boy,  "  You  can  go  now !  " 
Then  he  turned  again  to  Theron. 

"Well,  Mr.  Ware,  I'm  glad  to  see  you,"  he 
repeated,  and  drew  up  a  chair  by  the  window. 
"Things  are  going  all  right  with  you,  I  hope." 

Theron  noted  again  the  waving  black  hair,  the 
dark  skin,  and  the  carefully  trimmed  mustache 
and  chin-tuft  which  gave  the  lawyer's  face  a  com 
bined  effect  of  romance  and  smartness.  No ;  it 
was  the  eyes,  cool,  shrewd,  dark-gray  eyes,  which 
suggested  this  latter  quality.  The  recollection  of 
having  seen  one  of  them  wink,  in  deliberate  hos 
tility  of  sarcasm,  when  those  other  trustees  had 
their  backs  turned,  came  mercifully  at  the  moment 
to  recall  the  young  minister  to  his  errand. 

"  I  thought  I  would  drop  in  and  have  a  chat 
with  you,"  he  said,  getting  better  under  way  as  he 
went  on.  "  Quarterly  Conference  is  only  a  fort 
night  off,  and  I  am  a  good  deal  at  sea  about  what 
is  going  to  happen." 

"  I  'm  not  a  church  member,  you  know,"  inter 
posed  Gorringe.  "That  shuts  me  out  of  the 
Quarterly  Conference." 

"Alas,  yes  !  "  said  Theron.  "I  wish  it  did  n't. 
I  'm  afraid  I  'm  not  going  to  have  any  friends  to 
spare  there." 

"  What  are  you  afraid  of?  "  asked  the  lawyer, 
seeming  now  to  be  wholly  at  his  ease  again. 
"They  can't  eat  you." 

178 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  No,  they  keep  me  too  lean  for  that,"  responded 
Theron,  with  a  pensive  smile.  "  I  was  going  to 
ask,  you  know,  for  an  increase  of  salary,  or  an 
extra  allowance.  I  don't  see  how  I  can  go  on  as 
it  is.  The  sum  fixed  by  the  last  Quarterly  Confer 
ence  of  the  old  year,  and  which  I  am  getting  now, 
is  one  hundred  dollars  less  than  my  predecessor 
had.  That  isn't  fair,  and  it  isn't  right.  But  so 
far  from  its  looking  as  if  I  could  get  an  increase, 
the  prospect  seems  rather  that  they  will  make  me 
pay  for  the  gas  and  that  sidewalk.  I  never  re 
covered  more  than  about  half  of  my  moving  ex 
penses,  as  you  know,  and  —  and,  frankly,  I  don't 
know  which  way  to  turn.  It  keeps  me  miserable 
all  the  while." 

"That's  where  you're  wrong,"  said  Mr.  Gor- 
ringe.  "  If  you  let  things  like  that  worry  you, 
you  '11  keep  a  sore  skin  all  your  life.  You  take 
my  advice  and  just  go  ahead  your  own  gait,  and 
let  other  folks  do  the  worrying.  They  are  pretty 
close-fisted  here,  for  a  fact,  but  you  can  manage 
to  rub  along  somehow.  If  you  should  get  into 
any  real  difficulties,  why,  I  guess — "  the  lawyer 
paused  to  smile  in  a  hesitating,  significant  way,  — 
"  I  guess  some  road  out  can  be  found  all  right. 
The  main  thing  is,  don't  fret,  and  don't  allow  your 
wife  to  —  to  fret  either." 

He  stopped  abruptly.  Theron  nodded  in  re 
cognition  of  his  amiable  tone,  and  then  found  the 
nod  lengthening  itself  out  into  almost  a  bow  as 

179 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  thought  spread  through  his  mind  that  this 
had  been  nothing  more  nor  less  than  a  promise 
to  help  him  with  money  if  worst  came  to  worst. 
He  looked  at  Levi  Gorringe,  and  said  to  himself 
that  the  intuition  of  women  was  wonderful.  Alice 
had  picked  him  out  as  a  friend  of  theirs  merely  by 
seeing  him  pass  the  house. 

"Yes,"  he  said ;  "  I  am  specially  anxious  to  keep 
my  wife  from  worrying.  She  was  surrounded  in 
her  girlhood  by  a  good  deal  of  what,  relatively,  we 
should  call  luxury,  and  that  makes  it  all  the  harder 
for  her  to  be  a  poor  minister's  wife.  I  had  quite 
decided  to  get  her  a  hired  girl,  come  what  might, 
but  she  thinks  she  'd  rather  get  on  without  one. 
Her  health  is  better,  I  must  admit,  than  it  was 
when  we  came  here.  She  works  out  in  her  garden 
a  great  deal,  and  that  seems  to  agree  with  her." 

"  Octavius  is  a  healthy  place,  —  that 's  generally 
admitted,"  replied  the  lawyer,  with  indifference. 
He  seemed  not  to  be  interested  in  Mrs.  Ware's 
health,  but  looked  intently  out  through  the  window 
at  the  buildings  opposite,  and  drummed  with  his 
fingers  on  the  arms  of  his  chair. 

Theron  made  haste  to  revert  to  his  errand. 
"  Of  course,  your  not  being  in  the  Quarterly 
Conference,"  he  said,  "  renders  certain  things 
impossible.  But  I  did  n't  know  but  you  might 
have  some  knowledge  of  how  matters  are  going, 
what  plans  the  officials  of  the  church  had ;  they 
seem  to  have  agreed  to  tell  me  nothing." 

180 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"Well,  I  have  heard  this  much,"  responded 
Gorringe.  "  They  're  figuring  on  getting  the 
Soulsbys  here  to  raise  the  debt  and  kind  o'  shake 
things  up  generally.  I  guess  that 's  about  as  good 
as  settled.  Had  n't  you  heard  of  it?  " 

"  Not  a  breath  !  "  exclaimed  Theron,  mourn 
fully.  "  Well,"  he  added  upon  reflection,  "  I  'm 
sorry,  downright  sorry.  The  debt-raiser  seems  to 
me  about  the  lowest-down  thing  we  produce.  I  Ve 
heard  of  those  Soulsbys ;  I  saw  him  indeed  once 
at  Conference,  but  I  believe  she  is  the  head  of  the 
firm." 

"  Yes ;  she  wears  the  breeches,  I  understand," 
said  Gorringe,  sententiously. 

"  I  had  hoped,"  the  young  minister  began  with 
a  rueful  sigh,  "  in  fact,  I  felt  quite  confident  at  the 
outset  that  I  could  pay  off  this  debt,  and  put  the 
church  generally  on  a  new  footing,  by  giving  extra 
attention  to  my  pulpit  work.  It  is  hardly  for  me 
to  say  it,  but  in  other  places  where  I  have  been, 
my  preaching  has  been  rather  —  rather  a  feature 
in  the  town  itself.  I  have  always  been  accustomed 
to  attract  to  our  services  a  good  many  non-members, 
and  that,  as  you  know,  helps  tremendously  from 
a  money  point  of  view.  But  somehow  that  has 
failed  here.  I  doubt  if  the  average  congregations 
are  a  whit  larger  now  than  they  were  when  I  came 
in  April.  I  know  the  collections  are  not." 

"No,"  commented  the  lawyer,  slowly;  "you'll 
never  do  anything  in  that  line  in  Octavius.  You 

181 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

might,  of  course,  if  you  were  to  stay  here  and 
work  hard  at  it  for  five  or  six  years  — " 

"  Heaven  forbid  !  "  groaned  Mr.  Ware. 

"Quite  so,"  put  in  the  other.  "The  point  is 
that  the  Methodists  here  are  a  little  set  by  them 
selves.  I  don't  know  that  they  like  one  another 
specially,  but  I  do  know  that  they  are  not  what 
you  might  call  popular  with  people  outside.  Now, 
a  new  preacher  at  the  Presbyterian  church,  or  even 
the  Baptist, — he  might  have  a  chance  to  create 
talk,  and  make  a  stir.  But  Methodist,  —  no ! 
People  who  don't  belong  won't  come  near  the 
Methodist  church  here  so  long  as  there  's  any 
other  place  with  a  roof  on  it  to  go  to.  Give  a 
dog  a  bad  name,  you  know.  Well,  the  Metho 
dists  here  have  got  a  bad  name ;  and  if  you  could 
preach  like  Henry  Ward  Beech  er  himself  you 
would  n't  change  it,  or  get  folks  to  come  and 
hear  you." 

"  I  see  what  you  mean,"  Theron  responded. 
"  I  'm  not  particularly  surprised  myself  that  Octa- 
vius  doesn't  love  us,  or  look  to  us  for  intellectual 
stimulation.  I  myself  leave  that  pulpit  more  often 
than  otherwise  feeling  like  a  wet  rag,  — utterly  limp 
and  discouraged.  But,  if  you  don't  mind  my 
speaking  of  it,  you  don't  belong,  and  yet  you 
come." 

It  was  evident  that  the  lawyer  did  not  mind. 
He  spoke  freely  in  reply.  "  Oh,  yes,  I  Ve  got 
into  the  habit  of  it.  I  began  going  when  I  first 

182 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

came  here,  and  —  and  so  it  grew  to  be  natural  for 
me  to  go.  Then,  of  course,  being  the  only  lawyer 
you  have,  a  considerable  amount  of  my  business  is 
mixed  up  in  one  way  or  another  with  your  mem 
bership  ;  you  see  those  are  really  the  things  which 
settle  a  man  in  a  rut,  and  keep  him  there." 

"  I  suppose  your  people  were  Methodists,"  said 
Theron,  to  fill  in  the  pause,  "  and  that  is  how  you 
originally  started  with  us." 

Levi  Gorringe  shook  his  head.  He  leaned  back, 
half  closed  his  eyes,  put  his  finger-tips  together, 
and  almost  smiled  as  if  something  in  retrospect 
pleased  and  moved  him. 

"  No,"  he  said ;  "  I  went  to  the  church  first  to 
see  a  girl  who  used  to  go  there.  It  was  long  be 
fore  your  time.  All  her  family  moved  away  years 
ago.  You  wouldn't  know  any  of  them.  I  was 
younger  then,  and  I  did  n't  know  as  much  as  I  do 
now.  I  worshipped  the  very  ground  that  girl 
walked  on,  and  like  a  fool  I  never  gave  her  so 
much  as  a  hint  of  it.  Looking  back  now,  I  can 
see  that  I  might  have  had  her  if  I  'd  asked  her. 
But  I  went  instead  and  sat  around  and  looked  at 
her  at  church  and  Sunday-school  and  prayer-meet 
ings  Thursday  nights,  and  class- meetings  after  the 
sermon.  She  was  devoted  to  religion  and  church 
work ;  and,  thinking  it  would  please  her,  I  joined 
the  church  on  probation.  Men  can  fool  them 
selves  easier  than  they  can  other  people.  I  actu 
ally  believed  at  the  time  that  I  had  experienced 

183 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

religion.  I  felt  myself  full  of  all  sorts  of  awaken 
ings  of  the  soul  and  so  forth.  But  it  was  really 
that  girl.  You  see  I  'm  telling  you  the  thing  just 
as  it  was.  I  was  very  happy.  I  think  it  was  the 
happiest  time  of  my  life.  I  remember  there  was 
a  love- feast  while  I  was  on  probation ;  and  I  sat 
down  in  front,  right  beside  her,  and  we  ate  the 
little  square  chunks  of  bread  and  drank  the  water 
together,  and  I  held  one  corner  of  her  hymn-book 
when  we  stood  up  and  sang.  That  was  the  near 
est  I  ever  got  to  her,  or  to  full  membership  in  the 
church.  That  very  next  week,  I  think  it  was,  we 
learned  that  she  had  got  engaged  to  the  minister's 
son,  —  a  young  man  who  had  just  become  a  minister 
himself.  They  got  married,  and  went  away  —  and 
I  —  somehow  I  never  took  up  my  membership 
when  the  six  months'  probation  was  over.  That 's 
how  it  was." 

"  It  is  very  interesting,"  remarked  Theron, 
softly,  after  a  little  silence,  — "  and  very  full  of 
human  nature." 

"  Well,  now  you  see,"  said  the  lawyer,  "  what  I 
mean  when  I  say  that  there  has  n't  been  another 
minister  here  since,  that  I  should  have  felt  like 
telling  this  story  to.  They  would  n't  have  under 
stood  it  at  all.  They  would  have  thought  it  was 
blasphemy  for  me  to  say  straight  out  that  what  I 
took  for  experiencing  religion  was  really  a  girl. 
But  you  are  different.  I  felt  that  at  once,  the  first 
time  I  saw  you.  In  a  pulpit  or  out  of  it,  what  I 

184 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

like  in  a  human  being  is  that  he  should  be 
human." 

"  It  pleases  me  beyond  measure  that  you  should 
like  me,  then,"  returned  the  young  minister,  with 
frank  gratification  shining  on  his  face.  "The 
world  is  made  all  the  sweeter  and  more  lovable  by 
these  —  these  elements  of  romance.  I  am  not 
one  of  those  who  would  wish  to  see  them  ban 
ished  or  frowned  upon.  I  don't  mind  admitting 
to  you  that  there  is  a  good  deal  in  Methodism  — 
I  mean  the  strict  practice  of  its  letter  which  you 
find  here  in  Octavius  —  that  is  personally  distaste 
ful  to  me.  I  read  the  other  day  of  an  English 
bishop  who  said  boldly,  publicly,  that  no  modern 
nation  could  practise  the  principles  laid  down  in 
the  Sermon  on  the  Mount  and  survive  for  twenty- 
four  hours." 

"  Ha,  ha  !  That 's  good  !  "  laughed  the  lawyer. 

"  I  felt  that  it  was  good,  too,"  pursued  Theron. 
"  I  am  getting  to  see  a  great  many  things  differ 
ently,  here  in  Octavius.  Our  Methodist  Discipline 
is  like  the  Beatitudes,  —  very  helpful  and  beautiful 
if  treated  as  spiritual  suggestion,  but  more  or  less 
of  a  stumbling-block  if  insisted  upon  literally.  I 
declare!"  he  added,  sitting  up  in  his  chair,  "I 
never  talked  like  this  to  a  living  soul  before  in  all 
my  life.  Your  confidences  were  contagious." 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Ware  rose  as  he  spoke,  and  took 
up  his  hat. 

"Must  you  be  going?"  asked  the  lawyer,  also 

•85 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

rising.  "  Well,  I  'm  glad  I  have  n't  shocked 
you.  Come  in  oftener  when  you  are  passing. 
And  if  you  see  anything  I  can  help  you  in,  always 
tell  me." 

The  two  men  shook  hands,  with  an  emphatic 
and  lingering  clasp. 

"/  am  glad,"  said  Theron,  "that  you  didn't 
stop  coming  to  church  just  because  you  lost  the 
girl." 

Levi  Gorringe  answered  the  minister's  pleasantry 
with  a  smile  which  curled  his  mustache  upward, 
and  expanded  in  little  wrinkles  at  the  ends  of  his 
eyes.  "  No,"  he  said  jestingly.  "  I  'm  death  on 
collecting  debts ;  and  I  reckon  that  the  church 
still  owes  me  a  girl.  I  '11  have  one  yet." 

So,  with  merriment  the  echoes  of  which  pleas 
antly  accompanied  Theron  down  the  stairway,  the 
two  men  parted. 


1*6 


CHAPTER  XIII 

THOUGH  Time  lagged  in  passing  with  a  slowness 
which  seemed  born  of  studied  insolence,  there  did 
arrive  at  last  a  day  which  had  something  definitive 
about  it  to  Theron's  disturbed  and  restless  mind. 
It  was  a  Thursday,  and  the  prayer-meeting  to  be 
held  that  evening  would  be  the  last  before  the 
Quarterly  Conference,  now  only  four  days  off. 

For  some  reason,  the  young  minister  found  him 
self  dwelling  upon  this  fact,  and  investing  it  with 
importance.  But  yesterday  the  Quarterly  Confer 
ence  had  seemed  a  long  way  ahead.  To-day 
brought  it  alarmingly  close  to  hand.  He  had  not 
heretofore  regarded  the  weekly  assemblage  for 
prayer  and  song  as  a  thing  calling  for  preparation, 
or  for  any  preliminary  thought.  Now  on  this 
Thursday  morning  he  went  to  his  desk  after  break 
fast,  which  was  a  sign  that  he  wanted  the  room  to 
himself,  quite  as  if  he  had  the  task  of  a  weighty 
sermon  before  him.  He  sat  at  the  desk  all  the 
forenoon,  doing  no  writing,  it  is  true,  but  remem 
bering  every  once  in  a  while,  when  his  mind 
turned  aside  from  the  book  in  his  hands,  that 
there  was  that  prayer-meeting  in  the  evening. 

187 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Sometimes  he  reached  the  point  of  vaguely  won 
dering  why  this  strictly  commonplace  affair  should 
be  forcing  itself  thus  upon  his  attention.  Then, 
with  a  kind  of  mental  shiver  at  the  recollec 
tion  that  this  was  Thursday,  and  that  the  great 
struggle  came  on  Monday,  he  would  go  back  to 
his  book. 

There  were  a  half-dozen  volumes  on  the  open 
desk  before  him.  He  had  taken  them  out  from 
beneath  a  pile  of  old  "  Sunday-School  Advocates  " 
and  church  magazines,  where  they  had  lain  hidden 
from  Alice's  view  most  of  the  week.  If  there  had 
been  a  locked  drawer  in  the  house,  he  would  have 
used  it  instead  to  hold  these  books,  which  had 
come  to  him  in  a  neat  parcel,  which  also  con 
tained  an  amiable  note  from  Dr.  Ledsmar, 
recalling  a  pleasant  evening  in  May,  and  expres 
sing  the  hope  that  the  accompanying  works  would 
be  of  some  service.  Theron  had  glanced  at  the 
backs  of  the  uppermost  two,  and  discovered  that 
their  author  was  Renan.  Then  he  had  hastily  put 
the  lot  in  the  best  place  he  could  think  of  to 
escape  his  wife's  observation. 

He  realized  now  that  there  had  been  no  need 
for  this  secrecy.  Of  the  other  four  books,  by 
Sayce,  Budge,  Smith,  and  Lenormant,  three  indeed 
revealed  themselves  to  be  published  under  religious 
auspices.  As  for  Renan,  he  might  have  known 
that  the  name  would  be  meaningless  to  Alice. 
The  feeling  that  he  himself  was  not  much  wiser  in 

188 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

this  matter  than  his  wife  may  have  led  him  to 
pass  over  the  learned  text-books  on  Chaldean 
antiquity,  and  even  the  volume  of  Renan  which 
appeared  to  be  devoted  to  Oriental  inscriptions, 
and  take  up  his  other  book,  entitled  in  the  trans 
lation,  "  Recollections  of  my  Youth."  This  he 
rather  glanced  through,  at  the  outset,  following 
with  a  certain  inattention  the  introductory  sketches 
and  essays,  which  dealt  with  an  unfamiliar,  and,  to 
his  notion,  somewhat  preposterous  Breton  racial 
type.  Then,  little  by  little,  it  dawned  upon  him 
that  there  was  a  connected  story  in  all  this ; 
and  suddenly  he  came  upon  it,  out  in  the  open,  as 
it  were.  It  was  the  story  of  how  a  deeply  devout 
young  man,  trained  from  his  earliest  boyhood  for 
the  sacred  office,  and  desiring  passionately  nothing 
but  to  be  worthy  of  it,  came  to  a  point  where,  at 
infinite  cost  of  pain  to  himself  and  of  anguish  to 
those  dearest  to  him,  he  had  to  declare  that  he 
could  no  longer  believe  at  all  in  revealed  religion. 
Theron  Ware  read  this  all  with  an  excited  inter 
est  which  no  book  had  ever  stirred  in  him  before. 
Much  of  it  he  read  over  and  over  again,  to  make 
sure  that  he  penetrated  everywhere  the  husk  of 
French  habits  of  thought  and  Catholic  methods  in 
which  the  kernel  was  wrapped.  He  broke  off  mid 
way  in  this  part  of  the  book  to  go  out  to  the  kitchen 
to  dinner,  and  began  the  meal  in  silence.  To 
Alice's  questions  he  replied  briefly  that  he  was 
preparing  himself  for  the  evening's  prayer-meeting. 

189 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

She  lifted  her  brows  in  such  frank  surprise  at  this 
that  he  made  a  further  and  somewhat  rambling 
explanation  about  having  again  taken  up  the  work 
on  his  book,  —  the  book  about  Abraham. 

"  I  thought  you  said  you  'd  given  that  up  alto 
gether,"  she  remarked. 

"  Well,"  he  said,  "  I  was  discouraged  about  it 
for  a  while.  But  a  man  never  does  anything  big 
without  getting  discouraged  over  and  over  again 
while  he  's  doing  it.  I  don't  say  now  that  I  shall 
write  precisely  that  book,  —  I'm  merely  reading 
scientific  works  about  the  period,  just  now,  —  but  if 
not  that,  I  shall  write  some  other  book.  Else  how 
will  you  get  that  piano  ?  "  he  added,  with  an  attempt 
at  a  smile. 

"  I  thought  you  had  given  that  up,  too  !  "  she 
replied  ruefully.  Then  before  he  could  speak,  she 
went  on  :  "  Never  mind  the  piano  ;  that  can  wait. 
What  I  Ve  got  on  my  mind  just  now  is  n't  piano  ; 
it 's  potatoes.  Do  you  know,  I  saw  some  the  other 
day  at  Rasbach's,  splendid  potatoes,  —  these  are 
some  of  them,  —  and  fifteen  cents  a  bushel  cheaper 
than  those  dried-up  old  things  Brother  Barnum 
keeps,  and  so  I  bought  two  bushels.  And  Sister 
Barnum  met  me  on  the  street  this  morning,  and 
threw  it  in  my  face  that  the  Discipline  commands 
us  to  trade  with  each  other.  Is  there  any  such 
command?  " 

"  Yes,"  said  the  husband.  "  It 's  Section  33. 
Don't  you  remember?  I  looked  it  up  in  Tyre. 

190 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

We  are  to  '  evidence  our  desire  of  salvation  by  doing 
good,  especially  to  them  that  are  of  the  household 
of  faith,  or  groaning  so  to  be  ;  by  employing  them 
preferably  to  others ;  buying  one  of  another ;  help 
ing  each  other  in  business,'  —  and  so  on.  Yes,  it 's 
all  there." 

"  Well,  I  told  her  I  did  n't  believe  it  was,"  put 
in  Alice,  "  and  I  said  that  even  if  it  was,  there  ought 
to  be  another  section  about  selling  potatoes  to  their 
minister  for  more  than  they  're  worth,  —  potatoes 
that  turn  all  green  when  you  boil  them,  too.  I 
believe  I  '11  read  up  that  old  Discipline  myself, 
and  see  if  it  has  n't  got  some  things  that  I  can  talk 
back  with." 

"The  very  section  before  that,  Number  32,  en 
joins  members  against  '  uncharitable  or  unprofitable 
conversation,  —  particularly  speaking  evil  of  magis 
trates  or  ministers.'  You  'd  have  'em  there,  I  think." 
Theron  had  begun  cheerfully  enough,  but  the  care 
worn,  preoccupied  look  returned  now  to  his  face. 
"  I  'm  sorry  if  we  've  fallen  out  with  the  Barnums," 
he  said.  "  His  brother-in-law,  Davis,  the  Sunday- 
school  superintendent,  is  a  member  of  the  Quarterly 
Conference,  you  know,  and  I  've  been  hoping  that 
he  was  on  my  side.  I  've  been  taking  a  good  deal 
of  pains  to  make  up  to  him." 

He  ended  with  a  sigh,  the  pathos  of  which  im 
pressed  Alice.  "  If  you  think  it  will  do  any  good," 
she  volunteered,  "  I  '11  go  and  call  on  the  Davises 
this  very  afternoon.  I  'm  sure  to  find  her  at  home, 

191 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

—  she  's  tied  hand  and  foot  with  that  brood  of 
hers,  —  and  you  'd  better  give  me  some  of  that  candy 
'or  them." 

Theron  nodded  his  approval  and  thanks,  and 
relapsed  into  silence.  When  the  meal  was  over,  he 
brought  out  the  confectionery  to  his  wife,  and  with 
out  a  word  went  back  to  that  remarkable  book. 

When  Alice  returned  toward  the  close  of  day,  to 
prepare  the  simple  tea  which  was  always  laid  a  half- 
hour  earlier  on  Thursdays  and  Sundays,  she  found 
her  husband  where  she  had  left  him,  still  busy  with 
those  new  scientific  works.  She  recounted  to  him 
some  incidents  of  her  call  upon  Mrs.  Davis,  as  she 
took  off  her  hat  and  put  on  the  big  kitchen  apron,  — 
how  pleased  Mrs.  Davis  seemed  to  be ;  how  her 
affection  for  her  sister-in-law,  the  grocer's  wife, 
disclosed  itself  to  be  not  even  skin-deep  ;  how  the 
children  leaped  upon  the  candy  as  if  they  had  never 
seen  any  before ;  and  how,  in  her  belief,  Mr.  Davis 
would  be  heart  and  soul  on  Theron's  side  at  the 
Conference. 

To  her  surprise,  the  young  minister  seemed  not 
at  all  interested.  He  hardly  looked  at  her  during 
her  narrative,  but  reclined  in  the  easy -chair  with 
his  head  thrown  back,  and  an  abstracted  gaze  wan 
dering  aimlessly  about  the  ceiling.  When  she 
avowed  her  faith  in  the  Sunday-school  superinten 
dent's  loyal  partisanship,  which  she  did  with  a  par 
donable  pride  in  having  helped  to  make  it  secure, 
her  husband  even  closed  his  eyes,  and  moved 

192 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

his  head  with   a   gesture   which    plainly   bespoke 
indifference. 

"  I  expected  you  'd  be  tickled  to  death,"  she 
remarked,  with  evident  disappointment. 

*'  I  Ve  a  bad  headache,"  he  explained,  after  a 
minute's  pause. 

"  No  wonder  !  "  Alice  rejoined,  sympathetically 
enough,  but  with  a  note  of  reproof  as  well.  "  What 
can  you  expect,  staying  cooped  up  in  here  all  day 
long,  poring  over  those  books?  People  are  all  the 
while  remarking  that  you  study  too  much.  I  tell 
them,  of  course,  that  you  're  a  great  hand  for  read 
ing,  and  always  were ;  but  I  think  myself  it  would 
be  better  if  you  got  out  more,  and  took  more 
exercise,  and  saw  people.  You  know  lots  and 
slathers  more  than  they  do  now,  or  ever  will,  if 
you  never  opened  another  book." 

Theron  regarded  her  with  an  expression  which 
she  had  never  seen  on  his  face  before.  "You 
don't  realize  what  you  are  saying,"  he  replied 
slowly.  He  sighed  as  he  added,  with  increased 
gravity,  "  I  am  the  most  ignorant  man  alive  !  " 

Alice  began  a  little  laugh  of  wifely  incredulity, 
and  then  let  it  die  away  as  she  recognized  that  he 
was  really  troubled  and  sad  in  his  mind.  She  bent 
over  to  kiss  him  lightly  on  the  brow,  and  tiptoed 
her  way  out  into  the  kitchen. 

"  I  believe  I  will  let  you  make  my  excuses  at 
the  prayer- meeting  this  evening,"   he   said   all  at 
once,    as  the  supper  came  to  an  end.     He   had 
X3  193 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

eaten  next  to  nothing  during  the  meal,  and  had 
sat  in  a  sort  of  brown-study  from  which  Alice  kindly 
forbore  to  arouse  him.  "  I  don't  know  —  I  hardly 
feel  equal  to  it.  They  won't  take  it  amiss  —  for 
once  —  if  you  explain  to  them  that  I  —  I  am  not 
at  all  well." 

"  Oh,  I  do  hope  you  're  not  coming  down  with 
anything  !  "  Alice  had  risen  too,  and  was  gazing 
at  him  with  a  solicitude  the  tenderness  of  which  at 
once  comforted,  and  in  some  obscure  way  jarred 
on  his  nerves.  "  Is  there  anything  I  can  do  —  or 
shall  I  go  for  a  doctor?  We've  got  mustard  in 
the  house,  and  senna  —  I  think  there  's  some  senna 
left  —  and  Jamaica  ginger." 

Theron  shook  his  head  wearily  at  her.  "  Oh,  no, 
—  no  !  "  he  expostulated.  "  It  is  n't  anything  that 
needs  drugs,  or  doctors  either.  It 's  just  mental 
worry  and  fatigue,  that 's  all.  An  evening's  quiet 
rest  in  the  big  chair,  and  early  to  bed,  —  that  will 
fix  me  up  all  right." 

"  But  you  '11  read ;  and  that  will  make  your 
head  worse,"  said  Alice. 

"  No,  I  won't  read  any  more,"  he  promised  her, 
walking  slowly  into  the  sitting-room,  and  settling 
himself  in  the  big  chair,  the  while  she  brought  out 
a  pillow  from  the  adjoining  best  bedroom,  and 
adjusted  it  behind  his  head.  "  That 's  nice  !  I  '11 
just  lie  quiet  here,  and  perhaps  doze  a  little  till  you 
come  back.  I  feel  in  the  mood  for  the  rest  j  it 
will  do  me  all  sorts  of  good." 

194 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

He  closed  his  eyes ;  and  Alice,  regarding  his  up 
turned  face  anxiously,  decided  that  already  it  looked 
more  at  peace  than  awhile  ago. 

"  Well,  I  hope  you  '11  be  better  when  I  get  back,'' 
she  said,  as  she  began  preparations  for  the  evening 
service.  These  consisted  in  combing  stiffly  back 
the  strands  of  light-brown  hair  which,  during  the 
day,  had  exuberantly  loosened  themselves  over  her 
temples  into  something  almost  like  curls ;  in  fas 
tening  down  upon  this  rebellious  hair  a  plain  brown- 
straw  bonnet,  guiltless  of  all  ornament  save  a  bind 
ing  ribbon  of  dull  umber  hue  ;  and  in  putting  on  a 
thin  dark-gray  shawl  and  a  pair  of  equally  subdued 
lisle-thread  gloves.  Thus  attired,  she  made  a  mis 
chievous  little  grimace  of  dislike  at  her  puritanical 
image  in  the  looking-glass  over  the  mantel,  and 
then  turned  to  announce  her  departure. 

"  Well,  I  'm  off,"  she  said.  Theron  opened  his 
eyes  to  take  in  this  figure  of  his  wife  dressed  for 
prayer-meeting,  and  then  closed  them  again 
abruptly.  "All  right,"  he  murmured,  and  then 
he  heard  the  door  shut  behind  her. 

Although  he  had  been  alone  all  day,  there  seemed 
to  be  quite  a  unique  value  and  quality  in  this 
present  solitude.  He  stretched  out  his  legs  on  the 
opposite  chair,  and  looked  lazily  about  him,  with 
the  feeling  that  at  last  he  had  secured  some  leisure, 
and  could  think  undisturbed  to  his  heart's  content. 
There  were  nearly  two  hours  of  unbroken  quiet  be 
fore  him ;  and  the  mere  fact  of  his  having  stepped 

'95 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

aside  from  the  routine  of  his  duty  to  procure  it 
marked  it  in  his  thoughts  as  a  special  occasion, 
which  ought  in  the  nature  of  things  to  yield  more 
than  the  ordinary  harvest  of  mental  profit. 

Theron's  musings  were  broken  in  upon  from 
time  to  time  by  rumbling  outbursts  of  hymn-singing 
from  the  church  next  door.  Surely,  he  said  to 
himself,  there  could  be  no  other  congregation  in 
the  Conference,  or  in  all  Methodism,  which  sang  so 
badly  as  these  Octavians  did.  The  noise,  as  it 
came  to  him  now  and  again,  divided  itself  familiarly 
into  a  main  strain  of  hard,  high,  sharp,  and  tinny 
female  voices,  with  three  or  four  concurrent  and 
clashing  branch  strains  of  part- singing  by  men  who 
did  not  know  how.  How  well  he  already  knew 
these  voices !  Through  two  wooden  walls  he 
could  detect  the  conceited  and  pushing  note  of 
Brother  Lovejoy,  who  tried  always  to  drown  the 
rest  out,  and  the  lifeless,  unmeasured  weight  of 
shrill  clamor  which  Sister  Barnum  hurled  into  every 
chorus,  half  closing  her  eyes  and  sticking  out  her 
chin  as  she  did  so.  They  drawled  their  hymns  too, 
these  people,  till  Theron  thought  he  understood 
that  injunction  in  the  Discipline  against  singing  too 
slowly.  It  had  puzzled  him  heretofore ;  now  he 
felt  that  it  must  have  been  meant  in  prophecy  for 
Octavius. 

It  was  impossible  not  to  recall  in  contrast  that 
other  church  music  he  had  heard,  a  month  before, 
and  the  whole  atmosphere  of  that  other  pastoral 

196 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

sitting-room,  from  which  he  had  listened  to  it. 
The  startled  and  crowded  impressions  of  that 
strange  evening  had  been  lying  hidden  in  his  mind 
all  this  while,  driven  into  a  corner  by  the  pressure 
of  more  ordinary,  every-day  matters.  They  came 
forth  now,  and  passed  across  his  brain,  —  no  longer 
confusing  and  distorted,  but  in  orderly  and  intelli 
gible  sequence.  Their  earlier  effect  had  been  one 
of  frightened  fascination.  Now  he  looked  them 
over  calmly  as  they  lifted  themselves,  one  by  one, 
and  found  himself  not  shrinking  at  all,  or  evading 
anything,  but  dwelling  upon  each  in  turn  as  a 
natural  and  welcome  part  of  the  most  important 
experience  of  his  life. 

The  young  minister  had  arrived,  all  at  once,  at 
this  conclusion.  Pie  did  not  question  at  all  the 
means  by  which  he  had  reached  it.  Nothing  was 
clearer  to  his  mind  than  the  conclusion  itself,  — 
that  his  meeting  with  the  priest  and  the  doctor  was 
the  turning-point  in  his  career.  They  had  lifted 
him  bodily  out  of  the  slough  of  ignorance,  of  con 
tact  with  low  minds  and  sordid,  narrow  things,  and 
put  him  on  solid  ground.  This  book  he  had  been 
reading  —  this  gentle,  tender,  lovable  book,  which 
had  as  much  true  piety  in  it  as  any  devotional 
book  he  had  ever  read,  and  yet,  unlike  all  devo 
tional  books,  put  its  foot  firmly  upon  everything 
which  could  not  be  proved  in  human  reason  to  be 
true  —  must  be  merely  one  of  a  thousand  which 
men  like  Father  Forbes  and  Dr.  Ledsmar  knew  by 

197 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

heart.  The  very  thought  that  he  was  on  the  way 
now  to  know  them,  too,  made  Theron  tremble. 
The  prospect  wooed  him,  and  he  thrilled  in  re 
sponse,  with  the  wistful  and  delicate  eagerness  of  a 
young  lover. 

Somehow,  the  fact  that  the  priest  and  the  doc 
tor  were  not  religious  men,  and  that  this  book 
which  had  so  impressed  and  stirred  him  was  noth 
ing  more  than  Kenan's  recital  of  how  he,  too, 
ceased  to  be  a  religious  man,  did  not  take  a  form 
which  Theron  could  look  square  in  the  face.  It 
wore  the  shape,  instead,  of  a  vague  premise  that 
there  were  a  great  many  different  kinds  of  religions, 
—  the  past  and  dead  races  had  multiplied  these  in 
their  time  literally  into  thousands,  —  and  that  each 
no  doubt  had  its  central  support  of  truth  some 
where  for  the  good  men  who  were  in  it,  and  that 
to  call  one  of  these  divine  and  condemn  all  the 
others  was  a  part  fit  only  for  untutored  bigots. 
Renan  had  formally  repudiated  Catholicism,  yet 
could  write  in  his  old  age  with  the  deepest  filial 
affection  of  the  Mother  Church  he  had  quitted. 
Father  Forbes  could  talk  coolly  about  the  "  Christ- 
myth  "  without  even  ceasing  to  be  a  priest,  and 
apparently  a  very  active  and  devoted  priest.  Evi 
dently  there  was  an  intellectual  world,  a  world  of 
culture  and  grace,  of  lofty  thoughts  and  the  inspir 
ing  communion  of  real  knowledge,  where  creeds 
were  not  of  importance,  and  where  men  asked  one 
another,  not  "  Is  your  soul  saved?"  but  "  Is  your 

198 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

mind  well  furnished?  "  Theron  had  the  sensation 
of  having  been  invited  to  become  a  citizen  of  this 
world.  The  thought  so  dazzled  him  that  his  im 
pulses  were  dragging  him  forward  to  take  the  new 
oath  of  allegiance  before  he  had  had  time  to 
reflect  upon  what  it  was  he  was  abandoning. 

The  droning  of  the  Doxology  from  the  church 
outside  stirred  Theron  suddenly  out  of  his  revery. 
It  had  grown  quite  dark,  and  he  rose  and  lit  the 
gas.  "  Blest  be  the  Tie  that  Binds,"  they  were 
singing.  He  paused,  with  hand  still  in  air,  to 
listen.  That  well-worn  phrase  arrested  his  atten 
tion,  and  gave  itself  a  new  meaning.  He  was 
bound  to  those  people,  it  was  true,  but  he  could 
never  again  harbor  the  delusion  that  the  tie  be 
tween  them  was  blessed.  There  was  vaguely 
present  in  his  mind  the  consciousness  that  other 
ties  were  loosening  as  well.  Be  that  as  it  might, 
one  thing  was  certain.  He  had  passed  definitely 
beyond  pretending  to  himself  that  there  was  any 
thing  spiritually  in  common  between  him  and  the 
Methodist  Church  of  Octavius.  The  necessity  of 
his  keeping  up  the  pretence  with  others  rose  on 
the  instant  like  a  looming  shadow  before  his  men 
tal  vision.  He  turned  away  from  it,  and  bent  his 
brain  to  think  of  something  else. 

The  noise  of  Alice  opening  the  front  door  came 
as  a  pleasant  digression.  A  second  later  it  became 
clear  from  the  sound  of  voices  that  she  had  brought 
some  one  back  with  her,  and  Theron  hastily 

199 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

f 

stretched  himself  out  again  in  the  armchair,  with 
his  head  back  in  the  pillow,  and  his  feet  on  the 
other  chair.  He  had  come  mighty  near  forgetting 
that  he  was  an  invalid,  and  he  protected  himself 
the  further  now  by  assuming  an  air  of  lassitude 
verging  upon  prostration. 

"  Yes  ;  there  's  a  light  burning.  It 's  all  right," 
he  heard  Alice  say.  She  entered  the  room,  and 
Theron's  head  was  too  bad  to  permit  him  to  turn 
it,  and  see  who  her  companion  was. 

"  Theron  dear,"  Alice  began,  "  I  knew  you  'd  be 
glad  to  see  her,  even  if  you  were  out  of  sorts  ;  and 
I  persuaded  her  just  to  run  in  for  a  minute.  Let 
me  introduce  you  to  Sister  Soulsby.  Sister  Soulsby, 
—  my  husband." 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Ware  sat  upright  with  an  ener 
getic  start,  and  fastened  upon  the  stranger  a  look 
which  conveyed  anything  but  the  satisfaction  his 
wife  had  been  so  sure  about.  It  was  at  the  first 
blush  an  undisguised  scowl ;  and  only  some  fleeting 
memory  of  that  reflection  about  needing  now  to 
dissemble,  prevented  him  from  still  frowning  as  he 
rose  to  his  feet,  and  perfunctorily  held  out  his  hand. 

"  Delighted,  I  'm  sure,"  he  mumbled.  Then, 
looking  up,  he  discovered  that  Sister  Soulsby  knew 
he  was  not  delighted,  and  that  she  seemed  not  to 
mind  in  the  least. 

"As  your  good  lady  said,  I  just  ran  in  for  a 
moment,"  she  remarked,  shaking  his  limp  hand 
with  a  brisk,  business-like  grasp,  and  dropping  it. 

200 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  I  hate  bothering  sick  people,  but  as  we  're  to  be 
thrown  together  a  good  deal  this  next  week  or  so, 
I  thought  I  'd  like  to  lose  no  time  in  saying 
'  howdy.'  I  won't  keep  you  up  now.  Your  wife 
has  been  sweet  enough  to  ask  me  to  move  my 
trunk  over  here  in  the  morning,  so  that  you  '11  see 
enough  of  me  and  to  spare." 

Theron  looked  falteringly  into  her  face,  as  he 
strove  for  words  which  should  sufficiently  mask 
the  disgust  this  intelligence  stirred  within  him. 
A  debt-raiser  in  the  town  was  bad  enough  !  A 
debt-raiser  quartered  in  the  very  parsonage  !  —  he 
ground  his  teeth  to  think  of  it. 

Alice  read  his  hesitation  aright.  "  Sister  Soulsby 
went  to  the  hotel,"  she  hastily  put  in ;  "  and  Loren 
Pierce  was  after  her  to  come  and  stay  at  his  house, 
and  /  ventured  to  tell  her  that  I  thought  we  could 
make  her  more  comfortable  here."  She  accom 
panied  this  by  so  daring  a  grimace  and  nod  that 
her  husband  woke  up  to  the  fact  that  a  point  in 
Conference  politics  was  involved. 

He  squeezed  a  doubtful  smile  upon  his  features. 
"  We  shall  both  do  our  best,"  he  said.  It  was  not 
easy,  but  he  forced  increasing  amiability  into  his 
glance  and  tone.  "  Is  Brother  Soulsby  here,  too  ?  " 
he  asked. 

The  debt- raiser  shook  her  head,  —  again  the 
prompt,  decisive  movement,  so  like  a  busy  man  of 
aifairs.  "  No,"  she  answered.  "  He  's  doing  sup 
ply  down  on  the  Hudson  this  week,  but  he  '11  be 

201 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

here  in  time  for  the  Sunday  morning  love- feast. 
I  always  like  to  come  on  ahead,  and  see  how  the 
land  lies.  Well,  good-night !  Your  head  will  be 
all  right  in  the  morning." 

Precisely  what  she  meant  by  this  assurance, 
Theron  did  not  attempt  to  guess.  He  received 
her  adieu,  noted  the  masterful  manner  in  which 
she  kissed  his  wife,  and  watched  her  pass  out  into 
the  hall,  with  the  feeling  uppermost  that  this  was  a 
person  who  decidedly  knew  her  way  about.  Much 
as  he  was  prepared  to  dislike  her,  and  much  as  he 
detested  the  vulgar  methods  her  profession  typi 
fied,  he  could  not  deny  that  she  seemed  a  very 
capable  sort  of  woman. 

This  mental  concession  did  not  prevent  his 
fixing  upon  Alice,  when  she  returned  to  the  room, 
a  glance  of  obvious  disapproval. 

"Theron,"  she  broke  forth,  to  anticipate  his 
reproach,  "  I  did  it  for  the  best.  The  Pierces 
would  have  got  her  if  I  had  n't  cut  in.  I  thought 
it  would  help  to  have  her  on  our  side.  And,  be 
sides,  I  like  her.  She  's  the  first  sister  I  've  seen 
since  we  Ve  been  in  this  hole  that 's  had  a  kind 
word  for  me  —  or  —  or  sympathized  with  me  ! 
And  —  and  —  if  you  're  going  to  be  offended  —  I 
shall  cry  !  " 

There  were  real  tears  on  her  lashes,  ready  to 
make  good  the  threat.  "  Oh,  I  guess  I  would  n't," 
said  Theron,  with  an  approach  to  his  old,  half-play 
ful  manner.  "  If  you  like  her,  that 's  the  chief  thing." 

202 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Alice  shook  her  tear-drops  away.  "  No,"  she 
replied,  with  a  wistful  smile  ;  "  the  chief  thing  is  to 
have  her  like  you.  She  's  as  smart  as  a  steel  trap, 
—  that  woman  is,  —  and  if  she  took  the  notion,  1 
believe  she  could  help  get  us  a  better  place." 


203 


THE  ensuing  week  went  by  with  a  buzz  and  a 
whirl,  circling  about  Theron  Ware's  dizzy  con 
sciousness  like  some  huge,  impalpable  teetotum 
sent  spinning  under  Sister  Soulsby's  resolute  hands. 
Whenever  his  vagrant  memory  recurred  to  it,  in 
after  months,  he  began  by  marvelling,  and  ended 
with  a  shudder  of  repulsion. 

It  was  a  week  crowded  with  events,  which 
seemed  to  him  to  shoot  past  so  swiftly  that  in 
effect  they  came  all  of  a  heap.  He  never  essayed 
the  task,  in  retrospect,  of  arranging  them  in  their 
order  of  sequence.  They  had,  however,  a  definite 
and  interdependent  chronology  which  it  is  worth 
the  while  to  trace. 

Mrs.  Soulsby  brought  her  trunk  round  to  the 
parsonage  bright  and  early  on  Friday  morning,  and 
took  up  her  lodgement  in  the  best  bedroom,  and 
her  headquarters  in  the  house  at  large,  with  a 
cheerful  and  business-like  manner.  She  desired 
nothing  so  much,  she  said,  as  that  people  should 
not  put  themselves  out  on  her  account,  or  allow 
her  to  get  in  their  way.  She  appeared  to  mean 
this,  too,  and  to  have  very  good  ideas  about 
securing  its  realization. 

204 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

During  both  Friday  and  the  following  day,  in 
deed,  Theron  saw  her  only  at  the  family  meals. 
There  she  displayed  a  hearty  relish  for  all  that 
was  set  before  her  which  quite  won  Mrs.  Ware's 
heart,  and  though  she  talked  rather  more  than 
Theron  found  himself  expecting  from  a  woman, 
he  could  not  deny  that  her  conversation  was  both 
seemly  and  entertaining.  She  had  evidently  been 
a  great  traveller,  and  referred  to  things  she  had 
seen  in  Savannah  or  Montreal  or  Los  Angeles  in 
as  matter-of-fact  fashion  as  he  could  have  spoken 
of  a  visit  to  Tecumseh.  Theron  asked  her  many 
questions  about  these  and  other  far-off  cities,  and 
her  answers  were  all  so  pat  and  showed  so  keen 
and  clear  an  eye  that  he  began  in  spite  of  himself 
to  think  of  her  with  a  certain  admiration. 

She  in  turn  plied  him  with  inquiries  about  the 
principal  pew-holders  and  members  of  his  congre 
gation,  —  their  means,  their  disposition,  and  the 
measure  of  their  devotion.  She  put  these  queries 
with  such  intelligence,  and  seemed  to  assimilate  his 
replies  with  such  an  alert  understanding,  that  the 
young  minister  was  spurred  to  put  dashes  of  char 
acter  in  his  descriptions,  and  set  forth  the  idio 
syncrasies  and  distinguishing  ear-marks  of  his  flock 
with  what  he  felt  afterward  might  have  been  too 
free  a  tongue.  But  at  the  time  her  fine  air  of 
appreciation  led  him  captive.  He  gossiped  about 
his  parishioners  as  if  he  enjoyed  it.  He  made  a 
specially  happy  thumb-nail  sketch  for  her  of  one  of 

205 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

his  trustees,  Erastus  Winch,  the  loud-mouthed, 
ostentatiously  jovial,  and  really  cold-hearted  cheese- 
buyer.  She  was  particularly  interested  in  hearing 
about  this  man.  The  personality  of  Winch  seemed 
to  have  impressed  her,  and  she  brought  the  talk 
back  to  him  more  than  once,  and  prompted  The- 
ron  to  the  very  threshold  of  indiscretion  in  his 
confidences  on  the  subject. 

Save  at  meal-times,  Sister  Soulsby  spent  the  two 
days  out  around  among  the  Methodists  of  Octa- 
vius.  She  had  little  or  nothing  to  say  about  what 
she  thus  saw  and  heard,  but  used  it  as  the  basis  for 
still  further  inquiries.  She  told  more  than  once, 
however,  of  how  she  had  been  pressed  here  or 
there  to  stay  to  dinner  or  supper,  and  how  she  had 
excused  herself.  "  I  Ve  knocked  about  too  much," 
she  would  explain  to  the  Wares,  "  not  to  fight  shy 
of  random  country  cooking.  When  I  find  such  a 
born  cook  as  you  are  —  well  —  I  know  when  I  'm 
well  off."  Alice  flushed  with  pleased  pride  at  this, 
and  Theron  himself  felt  that  their  visitor  showed 
great  good  sense.  By  Saturday  noon,  the  two 
women  were  calling  each  other  by  their  first  names. 
Theron  learned  with  a  certain  interest  that  Sister 
Soulsby's  Christian  name  was  Candace. 

It  was  only  natural  that  he  should  give  even 
more  thought  to  her  than  to  her  quaint  and  unfa 
miliar  old  Ethiopian  name.  She  was  undoubtedly 
a  very  smart  woman.  To  his  surprise  she  had  never 
introduced  in  her  talk  any  of  the  stock  religious 

206 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  devotional  phrases  which  official  Methodists 
so  universally  employed  in  mutual  converse.  She 
might  have  been  an  insurance  agent,  or  a  school 
teacher,  visiting  in  a  purely  secular  household,  so 
little  parade  of  cant  was  there  about  her. 

He  caught  himself  wondering  how  old  she  was. 
She  seemed  to  have  been  pretty  well  over  the 
whole  American  continent,  and  that  must  take 
years  of  time.  Perhaps,  however,  the  exertion  of 
so  muoh  travel  would  tend  to  age  one  in  appear 
ance.  Her  eyes  were  still  youthful,  —  decidedly 
wise  eyes,  but  still  juvenile.  They  had  sparkled 
with  almost  girlish  merriment  at  some  of  his  jokes. 
She  turned  them  about  a  good  deal  when  she 
spoke,  making  their  glances  fit  and  illustrate  the 
things  she  said.  He  had  never  met  any  one  whose 
eyes  played  so  constant  and  prominent  a  part  in 
their  owner's  conversation.  Theron  had  never  seen 
a  play ;  but  he  had  encountered  the  portraits  of 
famous  queens  of  the  drama  several  times  in  illus 
trated  papers  or  shop  windows,  and  it  occurred  to 
him  that  some  of  the  more  marked  contortions  of 
Sister  Soulsby's  eyes — notably  a  trick  she  had 
of  rolling  them  swiftly  round  and  plunging  them, 
so  to  speak,  into  an  intent,  yearning,  one  might 
almost  say  devouring,  gaze  at  the  speaker  —  were 
probably  employed  by  eminent  actresses  like 
Ristori  and  Fanny  Davenport. 

The  rest  of  Sister  Soulsby  was  undoubtedly  sub 
ordinated  in  interest  to  those  eyes  of  hers.     Some- 

207 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

times  her  face  seemed  to  be  reviving  temporarily 
a  comeliness  which  had  been  constant  in  former 
days ;  then  again  it  would  look  decidedly,  organ 
ically,  plain.  It  was  the  worn  and  loose-skinned 
face  of  a  nervous,  middle-aged  woman,  who  had 
had  more  than  her  share  of  trouble,  and  drank  too 
much  tea.  She  wore  the  collar  of  her  dress  rather 
low ;  and  Theron  found  himself  wondering  at  this, 
because,  though  long  and  expansive,  her  neck  cer 
tainly  showed  more  cords  and  cavities  than  con 
sorted  with  his  vague  ideal  of  statuesque  beauty. 
Then  he  wondered  at  himself  for  thinking  about  it, 
and  abruptly  reined  up  his  fancy,  only  to  find  that 
it  was  playing  with  speculations  as  to  whether  her 
yellowish  complexion  was  due  to  that  tea-drinking 
or  came  to  her  as  a  legacy  of  Southern  blood. 

He  knew  that  she  was  born  in  the  South  because 
she  said  so.  From  the  same  source  he  learned 
that  her  father  had .  been  a  wealthy  planter,  who 
was  ruined  by  the  war,  and  sank  into  a  premature 
grave  under  the  weight  of  his  accumulated  losses. 
The  large  dark  rings  around  her  eyes  grew  deeper 
still  in  their  shadows  when  she  told  about  this, 
and  her  ordinarily  sharp  voice  took  on  a  mellow 
cadence,  with  a  soft,  drawling  accent,  turning  &'s 
into  0's,  and  having  no  r's  to  speak  of.  Theron 
had  imbibed  somewhere  in  early  days  the  convic 
tion  that  the  South  was  the  land  of  romance,  of 
cavaliers  and  gallants  and  black  eyes  flashing 
behind  mantillas  and  outspread  fans,  and  some- 

208 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

how  when  Sister  Soulsby  used  this  intonation  she 
suggested  all  these  things. 

But  almost  all  her  talk  was  in  another  key,  — 
a  brisk,  direct,  idiomatic  manner  of  speech,  with 
an  intonation  hinting  at  no  section  in  particular. 
It  was  merely  that  of  the  city-dweller  as  distin 
guished  from  the  rustic.  She  was  of  about  Alice's 
height,  perhaps  a  shade  taller.  It  did  not  escape 
the  attention  of  the  Wares  that  she  wore  clothes 
of  a  more  stylish  cut  and  a  livelier  arrangement 
of  hues  than  any  Alice  had  ever  dared  own,  even 
in  lax- minded  Tyre.  The  two  talked  of  this  in 
their  room  on  Friday  night ;  and  Theron  explained 
that  congregations  would  tolerate  things  of  this 
sort  with  a  stranger  which  would  be  sharply  re 
sented  in  the  case  of  local  folk  whom  they  con 
trolled.  It  was  on  this  occasion  that  Alice  in 
turn  told  Theron  she  was  sure  Mrs.  Soulsby  had 
false  teeth,  —  a  confidence  which  she  immediately 
regretted  as  an  act  of  treachery  to  her  sex. 

On  Saturday  afternoon,  toward  evening,  Brother 
Soulsby  arrived,  and  was  guided  to  the  parsonage 
by  his  wife,  who  had  gone  to  the  depot  to  meet 
him.  They  must  have  talked  over  the  situation 
pretty  thoroughly  on  the  way,  for  by  the  time  the 
new-comer  had  washed  his  face  and  hands  and 
put  on  a  clean  collar,  Sister  Soulsby  was  ready  to 
announce  her  plan  of  campaign  in  detail. 

Her  husband  was  a  man  of  small  stature  and, 
like  herself,  of  uncertain  age.     He  had  a  gentle, 
14  209 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

if  rather  dry,  clean-shaven  face,  and  wore  his  dust- 
colored  hair  long  behind.  His  little  figure  was 
clad  in  black  clothes  of  a  distinctively  clerical 
fashion,  and  he  had  a  white  neck-cloth  neatly  tied 
under  his  collar.  The  Wares  noted  that  he  looked 
clean  and  amiable  rather  than  intellectually  or  spirit 
ually  powerful,  as  he  took  the  vacant  seat  between 
theirs,  and  joined  them  in  concentrating  attention 
upon  Mrs.  Soulsby. 

This  lady,  holding  herself  erect  and  alert  on 
the  edge  of  the  low,  big  easy-chair,  had  the  air 
of  presiding  over  a  meeting. 

"  My  idea  is,"  she  began,  with  an  easy  impli 
cation  that  no  one  else's  idea  was  needed,  "  that 
your  Quarterly  Conference,  when  it  meets  on 
Monday,  must  be  adjourned  to  Tuesday.  We 
will  have  the  people  all  out  to-morrow  morning  to 
love-feast,  and  announcement  can  be  made  there, 
and  at  the  morning  service  afterward,  that  a  series 
of  revival  meetings  are  to  be  begun  that  same 
evening.  Mr.  Soulsby  and  I  can  take  charge  in 
the  evening,  and  we  '11  see  to  it  that  that  packs  the 
house,  —  fills  the  church  to  overflowing  Monday 
evening.  Then  we  '11  quietly  turn  the  meeting  into 
a  debt-raising  convention,  before  they  know  where 
they  are,  and  we  '11  wipe  off  the  best  part  of  the 
load.  Now,  don't  you  see,"  she  turned  her  eyes 
full  upon  Theron  as  she  spoke,  "  you  want  to 
hold  your  Quarterly  Conference  after  this  money  's 
been  raised,  not  before." 

210 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  I  see  what  you  mean,"  Mr.  Ware  responded 
gravely.  "  But  —  " 

"  But  what !  "  Sister  Soulsby  interjected,  with 
vivacity. 

"  Well,"  said  Theron,  picking  his  words,  "  in 
the  first  place,  it  rests  with  the  Presiding  Elder  to 
say  whether  an  adjournment  can  be  made  until 
Tuesday,  not  with  me." 

"  That  ;s  all  right.  Leave  that  to  me,"  said  the 
lady. 

"  In  the  second  place,"  Theron  went  on,  still 
more  hesitatingly,  "there  seems  a  certain — what 
shall  I  say? —  indirection  in  —  in  —  " 

"  In  getting  them  together  for  a  revival,  and 
springing  a  debt-raising  on  them?"  Sister  Soulsby 
put  in.  "  Why,  man  alive,  that 's  the  best  part  of 
it.  You  ought  to  be  getting  some  notion  by  this 
time  what  these  Octavius  folks  of  yours  are  like. 
I  Ve  only  been  here  two  days,  but  I  've  got  their 
measure  down  to  an  allspice.  Supposing  you 
were  to  announce  to-morrow  that  the  debt  was  to 
be  raised  Monday.  How  many  men  with  bank- 
accounts  would  turn  up,  do  you  think  ?  You  could 
put  them  all  in  your  eye,  sir,  —  all  in  your  eye  ! " 

"Very  possibly  you  're  right,"  faltered  the  young 
minister. 

"Right?  Why,  of  course  I'm  right,"  she  said, 
with  placid  confidence.  "  You  Ve  got  to  take 
folks  as  you  find  them ;  and  you  Ve  got  to  find 
them  the  best  way  you  can.  One  place  can  be 

211 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

worked,  managed,  in  one  way,  and  another  needs 
quite  a  different  way,  and  both  ways  would  be 
dead  frosts  —  complete  failures — in  a  third." 

Brother  Soulsby  coughed  softly  here,  and  shuf 
fled  his  feet  for  an  instant  on  the  carpet.  His 
wife  resumed  her  remarks  with  slightly  abated 
animation,  and  at  a  slower  pace. 

"  My  experience,"  she  said,  "  has  shown  me 
that  the  Apostle  was  right.  To  properly  serve 
the  cause,  one  must  be  all  things  to  all  men.  I 
have  known  very  queer  things  indeed  turn  out  to 
be  means  of  grace.  You  simply  carft  get  along 
without  some  of  the  wisdom  of  the  serpent.  We 
are  commanded  to  have  it,  for  that  matter.  And 
now,  speaking  of  that,  do  you  know  when  the 
Presiding  Elder  arrives  in  town  to-daj',  and  where 
he  is  going  to  eat  supper  and  sleep?  " 

Theron  shook  his  head.  "All  1  know  is  he 
isn't  likely  to  come  here,"  he  said,  and  added 
sadly,  "  I  'm  afraid  he  's  not  an  admirer  of 
mine." 

"  Perhaps  that 's  not  all  his  fault,"  commented 
Sister  Soulsby.  "  I  '11  tell  you  something.  He 
came  in  on  the  same  train  as  my  husband,  and 
that  old  trustee  Pierce  of  yours  was  waiting  for 
him  with  his  buggy,  and  I  saw  like  a  flash  what 
was  in  the  wind,  and  the  minute  the  train  stopped 
I  caught  the  Presiding  Elder,  and  invited  him  in 
your  name  to  come  right  here  and  stay;  told 
him  you  and  Alice  were  just  set  on  his  coming,  — 

212 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

would  n't  take  no  for  an  answer.  Of  course  he 
could  n't  come,  —  I  knew  well  enough  he  had 
promised  old  Pierce,  —  but  we  got  in  our  invitation 
anyway,  and  it  won't  do  you  any  harm.  Now, 
that 's  what  I  call  having  some  gumption,  —  wisdom 
of  the  serpent,  and  so  on." 

"  I  'm  sure,"  remarked  Alice,  "  I  should  have 
been  mortified  to  death  if  he  had  come.  We  lost 
the  extension-leaf  to  our  table  in  moving,  and  four 
is  all  it  '11  seat  decently." 

Sister  Soulsby  smiled  winningly  into  the  wife's 
honest  face.  "  Don't  you  see,  dear,"  she  ex 
plained  patiently,  "  I  only  asked  him  because  I 
knew  he  could  n't  come.  A  little  butter  spreads 
a  long  way,  if  it 's  only  intelligently  warmed." 

"  It  was  certainly  very  ingenious  of  you,"  Theron 
began  almost  stiffly.  Then  he  yielded  to  the 
humanities,  and  with  a  kindling  smile  added, 
"  And  it  was  as  kind  as  kind  could  be.  I  'm 
afraid  your  're  wrong  about  it 's  doing  me  any  good, 
but  I  can  see  how  well  you  meant  it,  and  I  'm 
grateful." 

"We  could  have  sneaked  in  the  kitchen  table, 
perhaps,  while  he  was  out  in  the  garden,  and  put 
on  the  extra  long  tablecloth,"  interjected  Alice, 
musingly. 

Sister  Soulsby  smiled  again  at  Sister  Ware,  but 
without  any  words  this  time ;  and  Alice  on  the 
instant  rose,  with  the  remark  that  she  must  be 
going  out  to  see  about  supper. 

213 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  I  'm  going  to  insist  on  coming  out  to  help 
you,"  Mrs.  Soulsby  declared,  "  as  soon  as  I  've 
talked  over  one  little  matter  with  your  husband. 
Oh,  yes,  you  must  let  me  this  time.  I  insist !  " 

As  the  kitchen  door  closed  behind  Mrs.  Ware,  a 
swift  and  apparently  significant  glance  shot  its 
way  across  from  Sister  Soulsby's  roving,  eloquent 
eyes  to  the  calmer  and  smaller  gray  orbs  of  her 
husband.  He  rose  to  his  feet,  made  some  little 
explanation  about  being  a  gardener  himself,  and 
desiring  to  inspect  more  closely  some  rhododen 
drons  he  had  noticed  in  the  garden,  and  forth 
with  moved  decorously  out  by  the  other  door  into 
the  front  hall.  They  heard  his  footsteps  on  the 
gravel  beneath  the  window  before  Mrs.  Soulsby 
spoke  again. 

"  You  're  right  about  the  Presiding  Elder,  and 
you  're  wrong,"  she  said.  "  He  is  n't  what  one 
might  call  precisely  in  love  with  you.  Oh,  I  know 
the  story,  —  how  you  got  into  debt  at  Tyre,  and  he 
stepped  in  and  insisted  on  your  being  denied 
Tecumseh  and  sent  here  instead." 

"  He  was  responsible  for  that,  then,  was  he  ?  " 
broke  in  Theron,  with  contracted  brows. 

"Why,  don't  you  make  any  effort  to  find  out 
anything  at  tf///"she  asked  pertly  enough,  but 
with  such  obvious  good-nature  that  he  could  not 
but  have  pleasure  in  her  speech.  "  Why,  of  course 
he  did  it !  Who  else  did  you  suppose?  " 

"  Well,"  said  the  young  minister,  despondently, 

214 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  if  he  's  as  much  against  me  as  all  that,  I  might  as 
well  hang  up  my  fiddle  and  go  home." 

Sister  Soulsby  gave  a  little  involuntary  groan  of 
impatience.  She  bent  forward,  and,  lifting  her 
eyes,  rolled  them  at  him  in  a  curve  of  downward 
motion  which  suggested  to  his  fancy  the  image 
of  two  eagles  in  a  concerted  pounce  upon  a 
lamb. 

"My  friend,"  she  began,  with  a  new  note  of 
impressiveness  in  her  voice,  "  if  you  '11  pardon  my 
saying  it,  you  have  n't  got  the  spunk  of  a  mouse. 
If  you  're  going  to  lay  down,  and  let  everybody 
trample  over  you  just  as  they  please,  you  're 
right !  You  might  as  well  go  home.  But  now 
here,  this  is  what  I  wanted  to  say  to  you :  Do 
you  just  keep  your  hands  off  these  next  few 
days,  and  leave  this  whole  thing  to  me.  I  '11 
pull  it  into  shipshape  for  you.  No  —  wait  a 
minute  —  don't  interrupt  now.  I  have  taken  a 
liking  to  you.  You  Ve  got  brains,  and  you  've 
got  human  nature  in  you,  and  heart.  What 
you  lack  is  sa&e,  —  common-sense.  You  '11  get 
that,  too,  in  time,  and  meanwhile  I  'm  not  going 
to  stand  by  and  see  you  cut  up  and  fed  to  the  dogs 
for  want  of  it.  I  '11  get  you  through  this  scrape, 
and  put  you  on  your  feet  again,  right-side-up-with 
care,  because,  as  I  said,  I  like  you.  I  like  your 
wife,  too,  mind.  She  's  a  good,  honest  little  soul, 
and  she  worships  the  very  ground  you  tread  on. 
Of  course,  as  long  as  people  will  marry  in  their 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

teens,  the  wrong  people  will  get  yoked  up  together. 
But  that 's  neither  here  nor  there.  She  's  a  kind, 
sweet  little  body,  and  she  's  devoted  to  you,  and 
it  is  n't  every  intellectual  man  that  gets  even  that 
much.  But  now  it 's  a  go,  is  it  ?  You  promise  to 
keep  quiet,  do  you,  and  leave  the  whole  show  ab 
solutely  to  me?  Shake  hands  on  it." 

Sister  Soulsby  had  risen,  and  stood  now  holding 
out  her  hand  in  a  frank,  manly  fashion.  Theron 
looked  at  the  hand,  and  made  mental  notes  that 
there  were  a  good  many  veins  discernible  on  the 
small  wrist,  and  that  the  forearm  seemed  to  swell 
out  more  than  would  have  been  expected  in  a 
woman  producing  such  a  general  effect  of  lean 
ness.  He  caught  the  shine  of  a  thin  bracelet- 
band  of  gold  under  the  sleeve.  A  delicate,  sig 
nificant  odor  just  hinted  its  presence  in  the  air 
about  this  outstretched  arm,  —  something  which 
was  not  a  perfume,  yet  deserved  as  gracious  a 
name. 

He  rose  to  his  feet,  and  took  the  proffered  hand 
with  a  deliberate  gesture,  as  if  he  had  been  cau 
tiously  weighing  all  the  possible  arguments  for  and 
against  this  momentous  compact. 

"  I  promise,"  he  said  gravely,  and  the  two  palms 
squeezed  themselves  together  in  an  earnest  clasp. 

"  Right  you  are,"  exclaimed  the  lady,  once  more 
with  cheery  vivacity.  "  Mind,  when  it 's  all  over, 
I  'm  going  to  give  you  a  good,  serious,  downright 
talking  to,  —  a  regular  hoeing-over.  I  'm  not  sure  I 

216 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

sha'n't  give  you  a  sound  shaking  into  the  bargain. 
You  need  it.  And  now  I  'm  going  out  to  help 
Alice." 

The  Reverend  Mr.  Ware  remained  standing  after 
his  new  friend  had  left  the  room,  and  his  medita 
tive  face  wore  an  even  unusual  air  of  abstraction. 
He  strolled  aimlessly  over,  after  a  time,  to  the 
desk  by  the  window,  and  stood  there  looking  out 
at  the  slight  figure  of  Brother  Soulsby,  who  was 
bending  over  and  attentively  regarding  some  pink 
blossoms  on  a  shrub  through  what  seemed  to  be  a 
pocket  magnifying-glass. 

What  remained  uppermost  in  his  mind  was  not 
this  interesting  woman's  confident  pledge  of  cham 
pionship  in  his  material  difficulties.  He  found 
himself  dwelling  instead  upon  her  remark  about 
the  incongruous  results  of  early  marriages.  He 
wondered  idly  if  the  little  man  in  the  white  tie, 
fussing  out  there  over  that  rhododendron-bush,  had 
figured  in  her  thoughts  as  an  example  of  these 
evils.  Then  he  reflected  that  they  had  been  men 
tioned  in  clear  relation  to  talk  about  Alice. 

Now  that  he  faced  this  question,  it  was  as  if 
he  had  been  consciously  ignoring  and  putting  it 
aside  for  a  long  time.  How  was  it,  he  asked  him 
self  now,  that  Alice,  who  had  once  seemed  so  bright 
and  keen-witted,  who  had  in  truth  started  out  im 
measurably  his  superior  in  swiftness  of  apprehen 
sion  and  readiness  in  humorous  quips  and  conceits, 
should  have  grown  so  dull  ?  For  she  was  undoubt- 

217 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

edly  slow  to  understand  things  nowadays.  Her 
absurd  lugging  in  of  the  extension-table  problem, 
when  the  great  strategic  point  of  that  invitation 
foisted  upon  the  Presiding  Elder  came  up,  was 
only  the  latest  sample  of  a  score  of  these  heavy- 
minded  exhibitions  that  recalled  themselves  to 
him.  And  outsiders  were  apparently  beginning 
to  notice  it.  He  knew  by  intuition  what  those 
phrases,  "good,  honest  little  soul"  and  "kind, 
sweet  little  body  "  signified,  when  another  woman 
used  them  to  a  husband  about  his  wife.  The  very 
employment  of  that  word  "  little  "  was  enough,  con 
sidering  that  there  was  scarcely  more  than  a  hair's 
difference  between  Mrs.  Soulsby  and  Alice,  and  that 
they  were  both  rather  tall  than  otherwise,  as  the 
stature  of  women  went. 

What  she  had  said  about  the  chronic  misfor 
tunes  of  intellectual  men  in  such  matters  gave 
added  point  to  those  meaning  phrases.  Nobody 
could  deny  that  geniuses  and  men  of  conspicu 
ous  talent  had  as  a  rule,  all  through  history,  con 
tracted  unfortunate  marriages.  In  almost  every 
case  where  their  wives  were  remembered  at  all,  it 
was  on  account  of  their  abnormal  stupidity,  or  bad 
temper,  or  something  of  that  sort.  Take  Xantippe, 
for  example,  and  Shakespeare's  wife,  and  —  and 
—  well,  there  was  Byron,  and  Bulwer-Lytton,  and 
ever  so  many  others. 

Of  course  there  was  nothing  to  be  done  about  it. 
These  things  happened,  and  one  could  only  put 

218 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  best  possible  face  on  them,  and  live  one's 
appointed  life  as  patiently  and  contentedly  as 
might  be.  And  Alice  undoubtedly  merited  all 
the  praise  which  had  been  so  generously  bestowed 
upon  her.  She  was  good  and  honest  and  kindly, 
and  there  could  be  no  doubt  whatever  as  to  her 
utter  devotion  to  him.  These  were  tangible, 
solid  qualities,  which  must  always  secure  respect 
for  her.  It  was  true  that  she  no  longer  seemed 
to  be  very  popular  among  people.'  He  questioned 
whether  men,  for  instance,  like  Father  Forbes  and 
Dr.  Ledsmar  would  care  much  about  her.  Vis 
ions  of  the  wifeless  and  academic  calm  in  which 
these  men  spent  their  lives  —  an  existence  conse 
crated  to  literature  and  knowledge  and  familiarity 
with  all  the  loftiest  and  noblest  thoughts  of  the 
past  —  rose  and  enveloped  him  in  a  cloud  of  de 
pression.  No  such  lot  would  be  his  !  He  must 
labor  along  among  ignorant  and  spiteful  narrow- 
minded  people  to  the  end  of  his  days,  pocketing 
their  insults  and  fawning  upon  the  harsh  hands  of 
jealous  nonentities  who  happened  to  be  his  official 
masters,  just  to  keep  a  roof  over  his  head  —  or 
rather  Alice's.  He  must  sacrifice  everything  to 
this,  —  his  ambitions,  his  passionate  desires  to  do 
real  good  in  the  world  on  a  large  scale,  his  mental 
freedom,  yes,  even  his  chance  of  having  truly  ele 
vating,  intellectual  friendships.  For  it  was  plain 
enough  that  the  men  whose  friendship  would  be  of 
genuine  and  stimulating  profit  to  him  would  not 

219 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

like  her.  Now  that  he  thought  of  it,  she  seemed 
latterly  to  make  no  friends  at  all. 

Suddenly,  as  he  watched  in  a  blank  sort  of  way 
Brother  Soulsby  take  out  a  penknife,  and  lop  an 
offending  twig  from  a  rose-bush  against  the  fence, 
something  occurred  to  him.  There  was  a  curious 
exception  to  that  rule  of  Alice's  isolation.  She 
had  made  at  least  one  friend.  Levi  Gorringe 
seemed  to  like  her  extremely. 

As  if  his  mind  had  been  a  camera,  Theron 
snapped  a  shutter  down  upon  this  odd,  unbidden 
idea,  and  turned  away  from  the  window. 

The  sounds  of  an  active,  almost  strenuous  con 
versation  in  female  voices  came  from  the  kitchen. 
Theron  opened  the  door  noiselessly,  and  put  in 
his  head,  conscious  of  something  furtive  in  his 
intention. 

"You  must  dreen  every  drop  of  water  off  the 
spinach,  mind,  before  you  put  it  over,  or  else  —  " 

It  was  Sister  Soulsby's  sharp  and  penetrating 
tones  which  came  to  him.  Theron  closed  the 
door  again,  and  surrendered  himself  once  more 
to  the  circling  whirl  of  his  thoughts. 


220 


CHAPTER   XV 

A  LOVE- FEAST  at  nine  in  the  morning  opened 
the  public  services  of  a  Sunday  still  memorable  in 
the  annals  of  Octavius  Methodism. 

This  ceremony,  which  four  times  a  year  pre 
ceded  the  sessions  of  the  Quarterly  Conference, 
was  not  necessarily  an  event  of  importance.  It 
was  an  occasion  upen  which  the  brethren  and 
sisters  who  clung  to  the  old-fashioned,  primitive 
ways  of  the  itinerant  circuit-riders,  let  themselves 
go  with  emphasized  independence,  putting  up 
more  vehement  prayers  than  usual,  and  adding  a 
special  fervor  of  noise  to  their  "  Amens  !  "  and 
other  interjections,  —  and  that  was  all. 

It  was  Theron's  first  love-feast  in  Octavius, 
and  as  the  big  class-room  in  the  church  basement 
began  to  fill  up,  and  he  noted  how  the  men  with 
ultra  radical  views  and  the  women  clad  in  the 
most  ostentatious  drabs  and  grays  were  crowding 
into  the  front  seats,  he  felt  his  spirits  sinking.  He 
had  literally  to  force  himself  from  sentence  to  sen 
tence,  when  the  time  came  for  him  to  rise  and 
open  the  proceedings  with  an  exhortation.  He 
had  eagerly  offered  this  function  to  the  Presiding 

221 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Elder,  the  Rev.  Aziel  P.  Larrabee,  who  sat  in 
severe  silence  on  the  little  platform  behind  him, 
but  had  been  informed  that  that  dignitary  would 
lead  off  in  giving  testimony  later  on.  So  Theron, 
feeling  all  the  while  the  hostile  eyes  of  the  Elder 
burning  holes  in  his  back,  dragged  himself  some 
how  through  the  task.  He  had  never  known  any 
such  difficulty  of  speech  before.  The  relief  was 
almost  overwhelming  when  he  came  to  the  cus 
tomary  part  where  all  are  adjured  to  be  as  brief  as 
possible  in  witnessing  for  the  Lord,  because  the 
time  belongs  to  all  the  people,  and  the  Discipline 
forbids  the  feast  to  last  more  than  ninety  minutes. 
He  delivered  this  injunction  to  brevity  with  marked 
earnestness,  and  then  sat  down  abruptly. 

There  was  some  rather  boisterous  singing,  dur 
ing  which  the  stewards,  beginning  with  the  plat 
form,  passed  plates  of  bread  cut  in  small  cubes, 
and  water  in  big  plated  pitchers  and  tumblers, 
about  among  the  congregation,  threading  their 
way  between  the  long  wooden  benches  ordinarily 
occupied  at  this  hour  by  the  children  of  the  Sun 
day-school,  and  helping  each  brother  and  sister  in 
turn.  They  held  by  the  old  custom,  here  in  Octa- 
vius,  and  all  along  the  seats  the  sexes  alternated, 
as  they  do  at  a  polite  dinner- table. 

Theron  impassively  watched  the  familiar  scene. 
The  early  nervousness  had  passed  away.  He  felt 
now  that  he  was  not  in  the  least  afraid  of  these 
people,  even  with  the  Presiding  Elder  thrown  in. 

222 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Folks  who  sang  with  such  unintelligence,  and  who 
threw  themselves  with  such  undignified  fervor  into 
this  childish  business  of  the  bread  and  water, 
could  not  be  formidable  antagonists  for  a  man  of 
intellect.  He  had  never  realized  before  what  a 
spectacle  the  Methodist  love-feast  probably  pre 
sented  to  outsiders.  What  must  they  think  of  it ! 
He  had  noticed  that  the  Soulsbys  sat  together, 
in  the  centre  and  toward  the  front.  Next  to 
Brother  Soulsby  sat  Alice.  He  thought  she  looked 
pale  and  preoccupied,  and  set  it  down  in  passing 
to  her  innate  distaste  for  the  sombre  garments  she 
was  wearing,  and  for  the  company  she  perforce 
found  herself  in.  Another  head  was  in  the  way, 
and  for  a  time  Theron  did  not  observe  who  sat 
beside  Alice  on  the  other  side.  When  at  last  he 
saw  that  it  was  Levi  Gorringe,  his  instinct  was  to 
wonder  what  the  lawyer  must  be  saying  to  himself 
about  these  noisy  and  shallow  enthusiasts.  A  re 
curring  emotion  of  loyalty  to  the  simple  people 
among  whom,  after  all,  he  had  lived  his  whole  life, 
prompted  him  to  feel  that  it  was  n't  wholly  nice  of 
Gorringe  to  come  and  enjoy  this  revelation  of 
their  foolish  side,  as  if  it  were  a  circus.  There 
was  some  vague  memory  in  his  mind  which  asso 
ciated  Gorringe  with  other  love-feasts,  and  with  a 
cynical  attitude  toward  them.  Oh,  yes  !  he  had 
told  how  he  went  to  one  just  for  the  sake  of 
sitting  beside  the  girl  he  admired  —  and  was 
pursuing. 

223 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

The  stewards  had  completed  their  round,  and 
the  loud,  discordant  singing  came  to  an  end. 
There  ensued  a  little  pause,  during  which  Theron 
turned  to  the  Presiding  Elder  with  a  gesture  of 
invitation  to  take  charge  of  the  further  proceed 
ings.  The  Elder  responded  with  another  gesture, 
calling  his  attention  to  something  going  on  in 
front. 

Brother  and  Sister  Soulsby,  to  the  considerable 
surprise  of  everybody,  had  risen  to  their  feet,  and 
were  standing  in  their  places,  quite  motionless,  and 
with  an  air  of  professional  self-assurance  dimly  dis 
cernible  under  a  large  show  of  humility.  They 
stood  thus  until  complete  silence  had  been  se 
cured.  Then  the  woman,  lifting  her  head,  began 
to  sing.  The  words  were  "  Rock  of  Ages,"  but  no 
one  present  had  heard  the  tune  to  which  she 
wedded  them.  Her  voice  was  full  and  very  sweet, 
and  had  in  it  tender  cadences  which  all  her  hearers 
found  touching.  She  knew  how  to  sing,  and  she 
put  forth  the  words  so  that  each  was  distinctly 
intelligible.  There  came  a  part  where  Brother 
Soulsby,  lifting  his  head  in  turn,  took  up  a  tuneful 
second  to  her  air.  Although  the  two  did  not,  as 
one  could  hear  by  listening  closely,  sing  the  same 
words  at  the  same  time,  they  produced  none  the 
less  most  .moving  and  delightful  harmonies  of 
sound. 

The  .experience  was  so  novel  and  charming  that 
listeners  ran  .ahead  in  their  minds  to  fix  the  num- 

224 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ber  of  verses  there  were  in  the  hymn,  and  to  hope 
that  none  would  be  left  out.  Toward  the  end, 
when  some  of  the  intolerably  self-conceited  local 
singers,  fancying  they  had  caught  the  tune,  started 
to  join  in,  they  were  stopped  by  an  indignant 
"  sh-h  !  "  which  rose  from  all  parts  of  the  class 
room  ;  and  the  Soulsbys,  with  a  patient  and  pensive 
kindliness  written  on  their  uplifted  faces,  gave 
that  verse  over  again. 

What  followed  seemed  obviously  restrained  and 
modified  by  the  effect  of  this  unlooked-for  and 
tranquillizing  overture.  The  Presiding  Elder  was 
known  to  enjoy  visits  to  old-fashioned  congrega 
tions  like  that  of  Octavius,  where  he  could  indulge 
to  the  full  his  inner  passion  for  high-pitched  pas 
sionate  invocations  and  violent  spiritual  demeanor, 
but  this  time  he  spoke  temperately,  almost  sooth 
ingly.  The  most  tempestuous  of  the  local  wit 
nesses  for  the  Lord  gave  in  their  testimony  in 
relatively  pacific  tones,  under  the  influence  of  the 
spell  which  good  music  had  laid  upon  the  gather 
ing.  There  was  the  deepest  interest  as  to  what 
the  two  visitors  would  do  in  this  way.  Brother 
Soulsby  spoke  first,  very  briefly  and  in  well- 
rounded  and  well-chosen,  if  conventional,  phrases. 
His  wife,  following  him,  delivered  in  a  melodious 
monotone  some  equally  hackneyed  remarks.  The 
assemblage,  listening  in  rapt  attention,  felt  the 
suggestion  of  reserved  power  in  every  sentence  she 
uttered,  and  burst  forth,  as  she  dropped  into  her 
15  225 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

seat,  in  a  loud  chorus  of  approving  ejaculations. 
The  Soulsbys  had  captured  Octavius  with  their 
first  outer  skirmish  line. 

Everything  seemed  to  move  forward  now  with  a 
new  zest  and  spontaneity.  Theron  had  picked 
out  for  the  occasion  the  best  of  those  sermons 
which  he  had  prepared  in  Tyre,  at  the  time  when 
he  was  justifying  his  ambition  to  be  accounted  a 
pulpit  orator.  It  -was  orthodox  enough,  but  had 
been  planned  as  the  framework  for  picturesque 
and  emotional  rhetoric  rather  than  doctrinal  edifi 
cation.  He  had  never  dreamed  of  trying  it  on 
Octavius  before,  and  only  on  the  yesterday  had 
quavered  at  his  own  daring  in  choosing  it  now. 
Nothing  but  the  desire  to  show  Sister  Soulsby 
what  was  in  him  had  held  him  to  the  selection. 

Something  of  this  same  desire  no  doubt  swayed 
and  steadied  him  now  in  the  pulpit.  The  labored 
slowness  of  his  beginning  seemed  to  him  to  be  due 
to  nervous  timidity,  until  suddenly,  looking  down 
into  those  big  eyes  of  Sister  Soulsby's,  which  were 
bent  gravely  upon  him  from  where  she  sat  beside 
Alice  in  the  minister's  pew,  he  remembered  that  it 
was  instead  the  studied  deliberation  which  art  had 
taught  him.  He  went  on,  feeling  more  and  more 
that  the  skill  and  histrionic  power  of  his  best  days 
were  returning  to  him,  were  as  marked  as  ever,  — 
nay,  had  never  triumphed  before  as  they  were 
triumphing  now.  The  congregation  watched  and 
listened,  with  open,  steadfast  eyes  and  parted  lips. 

226 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

For  the  first  time  in  all  that  weary  quarter,  their 
faces  shone.  The  sustaining  sparkle  of  their  gaze 
lifted  him  to  a  peroration  unrivalled  in  his  own 
recollection  of  himself. 

He  sat  down,  and  bent  his  head  forward  upon 
the  open  Bible,  breathing  hard,  but  suffused  with 
a  glow  of  satisfaction.  His  ears  caught  the  music 
of  that  sighing  rustle  through  the  audience  which 
bespeaks  a  profound  impression.  He  could 
scarcely  keep  the  fingers  of  his  hands,  covering 
his  bowed  face  in  a  devotional  posture  as  they 
were,  from  drumming  a  jubilant  tattoo.  His  pulses 
did  this  in  every  vein,  throbbing  with  excited 
exultation.  The  insistent  whim  seized  him,  as  he 
still  bent  thus  before  his  people,  to  whisper  to  his 
own  heart,  "  At  last !  The  dogs  !  " 

The  announcement  that  in  the  evening  a  series 
of  revival  meetings  was  to  be  inaugurated,  had 
been  made  at  the  love-feast,  and  it  was  repeated 
now  from  the  pulpit,  with  the  added  statement 
that  for  the  once  the  class-meetings  usually  fol 
lowing  this  morning  service  would  be  suspended. 
Then  Theron  came  down  the  steps,  conscious  after 
a  fashion  that  the  Presiding  Elder  had  laid  a  pro 
pitiatory  hand  on  his  shoulder  and  spoken  amiably 
about  the  sermon,  and  that  several  groups  of  more 
or  less  important  parishioners  were  waiting  in  the 
aisle  and  the  vestibule  to  shake  hands  and  tell  him 
how  much  they  had  enjoyed  the  sermon.  His 
mind  perversely  kept  hold  of  the  thought  that  all 

227 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

this  came  too  late.  He  politely  smiled  his  way 
along  out,  and,  overtaking  the  Soulsbys  and  his 
wife  near  the  parsonage  gate,  went  in  with  them. 

At  the  cold,  picked-up  noonday  meal  which  was 
the  Sunday  rule  of  the  house,  Theron  rather 
expected  that  his  guests  would  talk  about  the 
sermon,  or  at  any  rate  about  the  events  of  the 
morning.  A  Sabbath  chill  seemed  to  have  settled 
upon  both  their  tongues.  They  ate  almost  in 
silence,  and  their  sparse  remarks  touched  upon 
topics  far  removed  from  church  affairs.  Alice, 
too,  seemed  strangely  disinclined  to  conversation. 
The  husband  knew  her  face  and  its  varying  moods 
so  well  that  he  could  see  she  was  laboring  under 
some  very  powerful  and  deep  emotion.  No  doubt 
it  was  the  sermon,  the  oratorical  swing  of  which 
still  tingled  in  his  own  blood,  that  had  so  affected 
her.  If  she  had  said  so,  it  would  have  pleased 
him,  but  she  said  nothing. 

After  dinner,  Brother  Soulsby  disappeared  in 
his  bedroom,  with  the  remark  that  he  guessed  he 
would  lie  down  awhile.  Sister  Soulsby  put  on  her 
bonnet,  and,  explaining  that  she  always  prepared 
herself  for  an  evening's  work  by  a  long  solitary 
walk,  quitted  the  house.  Alice,  after  she  had  put 
the  dinner  things  away,  went  upstairs,  and  stayed 
there.  Left  to  himself,  Theron  spent  the  after 
noon  in  the  easy-chair,  and,  in  the  intervals  of 
confused  introspection,  read  "  Recollections  of 
my  Youth  "  through  again  from  cover  to  cover. 

228 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

He  went  through  the  remarkable  experiences 
attending  the  opening  of  the  revival,  when  evening 
came,  as  one  in  a  dream.  Long  before  the  hour 
for  the  service  arrived,  the  sexton  came  in  to  tell 
him  that  the  church  was  already  nearly  full,  and  that 
it  was  going  to  be  impossible  to  preserve  any  dis 
tinction  in  the  matter  of  pews.  When  the  party 
from  the  parsonage  went  over  —  after  another  cold 
and  mostly  silent  meal  —  it  was  to  find  the 
interior  of  the  church  densely  packed,  and  people 
being  turned  away  from  the  doors. 

Theron  was  supposed  to  preside  over  what  fol 
lowed,  and  he  did  sit  on  the  central  chair  in  the 
pulpit,  between  the  Presiding  Elder  and  Brother 
Soulsby,  and  on  the  several  needful  occasions  did 
rise  and  perfunctorily  make  the  formal  remarks  re 
quired  of  him.  The  Elder  preached  a  short,  but 
vigorously  phrased  sermon.  The  Soulsbys  sang 
three  or  four  times  —  on  each  occasion  with  fami 
liar  hymnal  words  set  to  novel,  concerted  music  — 
and  then  separately  exhorted  the  assemblage. 
The  husband's  part  seemed  well  done.  If  his 
speech  lacked  some  of  the  fire  of  the  divine  gird- 
ings  which  older  Methodists  recalled,  it  still  led 
straight,  and  with  kindling  fervency,  up  to.  a  season 
of  power.  The  wife  took  up  the  word  as  he  sat 
down.  She  had  risen  from  one  of  the.  side-seats  ; 
and,  speaking  as  she  walked,  she  moved  forward 
till  she  stood  within  the  altar-rail,  immediately 
under  the  pulpit,  and  from  this  place,  facing  the 

229 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

listening  throng,  she  delivered  her  harangue. 
Those  who  watched  her  words  most  intently  got 
the  least  sense  of  meaning  from  them.  The 
phrases  were  all  familiar  enough,  —  "  Jesus  a  very 
present  help,"  "Sprinkled  by  the  Blood,"  "  Com 
forted  by  the  Word,"  "  Sanctified  by  the  Spirit," 
"  Born  into  the  Kingdom,"  and  a  hundred  others, 
—  but  it  was  as  in  the  case  of  her  singing :  the 
words  were  old  ;  the  music  was  new. 

What  Sister  Soulsby  said  did  not  matter.  The 
way  she  said  it  —  the  splendid,  searching  sweep 
of  her  great  eyes ;  the  vibrating  roll  of  her  voice, 
now  full  of  tears,  now  scornful,  now  boldly,  jubi 
lantly  triumphant ;  the  sympathetic  swaying  of  her 
willowy  figure  under  the  stress  of  her  eloquence  — 
was  all  wonderful.  When  she  had  finished,  and 
stood,  flushed  and  panting,  beneath  the  shadow 
of  the  pulpit,  she  held  up  a  hand  deprecatingly 
as  the  resounding  "  Amens ! "  and  "  Bless  the 
Lords  !  "  began  to  well  up  about  her. 

"  You  have  heard  us  sing,"  she  said,  smiling  to 
apologize  for  her  shortness  of  breath.  "  Now  we 
want  to  hear  you  sing  !  " 

Her  husband  had  risen  as  she  spoke,  and  on  the 
instant,  with  a  far  greater  volume  of  voice  than 
they  had  hitherto  disclosed,  the  two  began  "  From 
Greenland's  Icy  Mountains,"  in  the  old,  familiar 
tune.  It  did  not  need  Sister  Soulsby's  urgent  and 
dramatic  gesture  to  lift  people  to  their  feet.  The 
whole  assemblage  sprang  up,  and,  under  the  guid- 

230 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ance  of  these  two  powerful  leading  voices,  thun 
dered  the  hymn  out  as  Octavius  had  never  heard 
it  before. 

While  its  echoes  were  still  alive,  the  woman 
began  speaking  again.  "Don't  sit  down!"  she 
cried.  "  You  would  stand  up  if  the  President  of 
the  United  States  was  going  by,  even  if  he  was 
only  going  fishing.  How  much  more  should  you 
stand  up  in  honor  of  living  souls  passing  forward 
to  find  their  Saviour  !  " 

The  psychological  moment  was  upon  them. 
Groans  and  cries  arose,  and  a  palpable  ferment 
stirred  the  throng.  The  exhortation  to  sinners 
to  declare  themselves,  to  come  to  the  altar, 
was  not  only  on  the  revivalist's  lips :  it  seemed 
to  quiver  in  the  very  air,  to  be  borne  on  every 
inarticulate  exclamation  in  the  clamor  of  the 
brethren.  A  young  woman,  with  a  dazed  and 
startled  look  in  her  eyes,  rose  in  the  body  of  the 
church  tremblingly  hesitated  for  a  moment,  and 
then,  with  bowed  head  and  blushing  cheeks, 
pressed  her  way  out  from  the  end  of  a  crowded 
pew  and  down  the  aisle  to  the  rail.  A  triumphant 
outburst  of  welcoming  ejaculations  swelled  to 
the  roof  as  she  knelt  there,  and  under  its  impetus 
others  followed  her  example.  With  interspersed 
snatches  of  song  and  shouted  encouragements  the 
excitement  reached  its  height  only  when  twoscore 
people,  mostly  young,  were  tightly  clustered  upon 
their  knees  about  the  rail,  and  in  the  space  open- 

231 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ing  upon  the  aisle.  Above  the  confusion  of  peni 
tential  sobs  and  moans,  and  the  hysterical  murmur- 
ings  of  members  whose  conviction  of  entire  sanctity 
kept  them  in  their  seats,  could  be  heard  the  voices 
of  the  Presiding  Elder,  the  Soulsbys,  and  the 
elderly  deacons  of  the  church,  who  moved  about 
among  the  kneeling  mourners,  bending  over  them 
and  patting  their  shoulders,  and  calling  out  to 
them  :  "  Fasten  your  thoughts  on  Jesus  !  "  "  Oh, 
the  Precious  Blood  !  "  "  Blessed  be  His  Name  !  " 
"  Seek  Him,  and  you  shall  find  Him  !  "  "  Cling 
to  Jesus,  and  Him  Crucified  !" 

The  Rev.  Theron  Ware  did  not,  with  the  others, 
descend  from  the  pulpit.  Seated  where  he  could 
not  see  Sister  Soulsby,  he  had  failed  utterly  to  be 
moved  by  the  wave  of  enthusiasm  she  had  evoked. 
What  he  heard  her  say  disappointed  him.  He 
had  expected  from  her  more  originality,  more 
spice  of  her  own  idiomatic,  individual  sort.  He 
viewed  with  a  cold  sense  of  aloofness  the  evidences 
of  her  success  when  they  began  to  come  forward 
and  abase  themselves  at  the  altar.  The  instant 
resolve  that,  come  what  might,  he  would  not  go 
down  there  among  them,  sprang  up  ready-made  in 
his  mind.  He  saw  his  two  companions  pass  him 
and  descend  the  pulpit  stairs,  and  their  action 
only  hardened  his  resolution.  If  an  excuse  were 
needed,  he  was  presiding,  and  the  place  to  preside 
in  was  the  pulpit.  But  he  waived  in  his  mind  the 
whole  question  of  an  excuse. 

232 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

After  a  little,  he  put  his  hand  over  his  face,  lean 
ing  the  elbow  forward  on  the  reading-desk.  The 
scene  below  would  have  thrilled  him  to  the  marrow 
six  months,  —  yes,  three  months  ago.  He  put  a 
finger  across  his  eyes  now,  to  half  shut  it  out.  The 
spectacle  of  these  silly  young  "  mourners "  — 
kneeling  they  knew  not  why,  trembling  at  they 
could  not  tell  what,  pledging  themselves  frantically 
to  dogmas  and  mysteries  they  knew  nothing  of, 
under  the  influence  of  a  hubbub  of  outcries  as 
meaningless  in  their  way,  and  inspiring  in  much 
the  same  way,  as  the  racket  of  a  fife  and  drum 
corps,  —  the  spectacle  saddened  and  humiliated 
him  now.  He  was  conscious  of  a  dawning  sense 
of  shame  at  being  even  tacitly  responsible  for  such 
a  thing.  His  fancy  conjured  up  the  idea  of  Dr. 
Ledsmar  coming  in  and  beholding  this  maudlin 
and  unseemly  scene,  and  he  felt  his  face  grow  hot 
at  the  bare  thought. 

Looking  through  his  fingers,  Theron  all  at  once 
saw  something  which  caught  at  his  breath  with  a 
sharp  clutch.  Alice  had  risen  from  the  minister's 
pew  —  the  most  conspicuous  one  in  the  church  — 
and  was  moving  down  the  aisle  toward  the  rail, 
her  uplifted  face  chalk-like  in  its  whiteness,  and  her 
eyes  wide-open,  looking  straight  ahead. 

The  young  pastor  could  scarcely  credit  his  sight. 
He  thrust  aside  his  hand,  and  bent  forward,  only 
to  see  his  wife  sink  upon  her  knees  among  the 
rest,  and  to  hear  this  notable  accession  to  the 

233 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  mourners "  hailed  by  a  tumult  of  approving 
shoutsi.  Then,  remembering  himself,  he  drew 
back  and  put  up  his  hand,  shutting  out  the  strange 
scene  altogether.  To  see  nothing  at  all  was  a 
relief,  and  under  cover  he  closed  his  eyes,  and  bit 
his  teeth  together. 

A  fresh  outburst  of  thanksgivings,  spreading 
noisily  through  the  congregation,  prompted  him  to 
peer  through  his  fingers  again.  Levi  Gorringe  was 
making  his  way  down  the  aisle,  —  was  at  the 
moment  quite  in  front.  Theron  found  himself 
watching  this  man  with  the  stern  composure  of  a 
fatalist.  The  clamant  brethren  down  below  were 
stirred  to  new  excitement  by  the  thought  that  the 
sceptical  lawyer,  so  long  with  them,  yet  not  of 
them,  had  been  humbled  and  won  by  the  out 
pourings  of  the  Spirit.  Theron's  perceptions  were 
keener.  He  knew  that  Gorringe  was  coming  for 
ward  to  kneel  beside  Alice.  The  knowledge  left 
him  curiously  undisturbed.  He  saw  the  lawyer 
advance,  gently  insinuate  himself  past  the  form  of 
some  kneeling  mourner  who  was  in  his  way,  and 
drop  on  his  knees  close  beside  the  bowed  figure 
of  Alice.  The  two  touched  shoulders  as  they 
bent  forward  beneath  Sister  Soulsby's  outstretched 
hands,  held  over  them  as  in  a  blessing.  Theron 
looked  fixedly  at  them,  and  professed  to  himself 
that  he  was  barely  interested. 

A  little  afterward,  he  was  standing  up  in  his 
place,  and  reading  aloud  a  list  of  names  which  one 

234 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

of  the  stewards  had  given  him.  They  were  the 
names  of  those  who  had  asked  that  evening  to  be 
taken  into  the  church  as  members  on  probation. 
The  sounds  of  the  recent  excitement  were  all 
hushed  now,  save  as  two  or  three  enthusiasts  in  a 
corner  raised  their  voices  in  abrupt  greeting  of 
each  name  in  its  turn,  but  Theron  felt  somehow 
that  this  noise  had  been  transferred  to  the  inside 
of  his  head.  A  continuous  buzzing  went  on  there, 
so  that  the  sound  of  his  voice  was  far-off  and  un 
familiar  in  his  ears. 

He  read  through  the  list  —  comprising  some 
fifteen  items  —  and  pronounced  the  names  with 
great  distinctness.  It  was  necessary  to  take  pains 
with  this,  because  the  only  name  his  blurred  eyes 
seemed  to  see  anywhere  on  the  foolscap  sheet  was 
that  of  Levi  Gorringe.  When  he  had  finished  and 
was  taking  his  seat,  some  one  began  speaking  to 
him  from  the  body  of  the  church.  He  saw  that 
this  was  the  steward,  who  was  explaining  to  him 
that  the  most  important  name  of  the  lot  —  that  of 
Brother  Gorringe  —  had  not  been  read  out. 

Theron  smiled  and  shook  his  head.  Then, 
when  the  Presiding  Elder  touched  him  on  the  arm, 
and  assured  him  that  he  had  not  mentioned  the 
name  in  question,  he  replied  quite  simply,  and 
with  another  smile,  "I  thought  it  was  the  only 
name  I  did  read  out." 

Then  he  sat  down  abruptly,  and  let  his  head  fall 
to  one  side.  There  were  hurried  movements 

235 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

inside  the  pulpit,  and  people  in  the  audience 
had  begun  to  stand  up  wonderingly,  when  the 
Presiding  Elder,  with  uplifted  hands,  confronted 
them. 

"  We  will  omit  the  Doxology,  and  depart  quietly 
after  the  benediction,"  he  said.  "  Brother  Ware 
seems  to  have  been  overcome  by  the  heat." 


236 


CHAPTER   XVI 

WHEN  Theron  woke  next  morning,  Alice  seemed 
to  have  dressed  and  left  the  room,  —  a  thing  which 
had  never  happened  before. 

This  fact  connected  itself  at  once  in  his  brain 
with  the  recollection  of  her  having  made  an  exhi 
bition  of  herself  the  previous  evening, — going  for 
ward  before  all  eyes  to  join  the  unconverted  and 
penitent  sinners,  as  if  she  were  some  tramp  or 
shady  female,  instead  of  an  educated  lady,  a  pro 
fessing  member  from  her  girlhood,  and  a  minis 
ter's  wife.  It  crossed  his  mind  that  probably  she 
had  risen  and  got  away  noiselessly,  for  very  shame 
at  looking  him.  in  the  face,  after  such  absurd 
behavior. 

Then  he  remembered  more,  and  grasped  the 
situation.  He  had  fainted  in  church,  and  had 
been  brought  home  and  helped  to  bed.  Dim 
memories  of  unaccustomed  faces  in  the  bedroom, 
of  nauseous  drugs  and  hushed  voices,  came  to  him 
out  of  the  night-time.  Now  that  he  thought  of  it, 
he  was  a  sick  man.  Having  settled  this,  he  went 
off  to  sleep  again,  a  feverish  and  broken  sleep,  and 
remained  in  this  state  most  of  the  time  for  the  fol- 

237 


I 
THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

lowing  twenty-four  hours.  In  the  brief  though 
numerous  intervals  of  waking,  he  found  certain 
things  clear  in  his  mind.  One  was  that  he  was 
annoyed  with  Alice,  but  would  dissemble  his  feel 
ings.  Another  was  that  it  was  much  pleasanter  to 
be  ill  than  to  be  forced  to  attend  and  take  part  in 
those  revival  meetings.  These  two  ideas  came 
and  went  in  a  lazy,  drowsy  fashion,  mixing  them 
selves  up  with  other  vagrant  fancies,  yet  always 
remaining  on  top. 

In  the  evening  the  singing  from  the  church  next 
door  filled  his  room.  The  Soulsbys'  part  of  it  was 
worth  keeping  awake  for.  He  turned  over  and 
deliberately  dozed  when  the  congregation  sang. 

Alice  came  up  a  number  of  times  during  the 
day  to  ask  how  he  felt,  and  to  bring  him  broth 
or  toast- water.  On  several  occasions,  when  he 
heard  her  step,  the  perverse  inclination  mastered 
him  to  shut  his  eyes,  and  pretend  to  be  asleep,  so 
that  she  might  tip-toe  out  again.  She  had  a 
depressed  and  thoughtful  air,  and  spoke  to  him 
like  one  whose  mind  was  on  something  else. 
Neither  of  them  alluded  to  what  had  happened  the 
previous  evening.  Toward  the  close  of  the  long 
day,  she  came  to  ask  him  whether  he  would  prefer 
her  to  remain  in  the  house,  instead  of  attending 
the  meeting. 

"  Go,  by  all  means,"  he  said  almost  curtly. 

The  Presiding  Elder  and  the  Sunday-school 
superintendent  called  early  Tuesday  morning  at 


I 

THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  parsonage  to  make  brotherly  inquiries,  and 
Theron  was  feeling  so  much  better  that  he  himself 
suggested  their  coining  upstairs  to  see  him.  The 
Elder  was  in  good  spirits ;  he  smiled  approvingly, 
and  even  put  in  a  jocose  word  or  two  while  the 
superintendent  sketched  for  the  invalid  in  a  cheer 
ful  way  the  leading  incidents  of  the  previous 
evening. 

There  had  been  an  enormous  crowd,  even 
greater  than  that  of  Sunday  night,  and  everybody 
had  been  looking  forward  to  another  notable  and 
exciting  season  of  grace.  These  expectations  were 
especially  heightened  when  Sister  Soulsby  ascended 
the  pulpit  stairs  and  took  charge  of  the  proceed 
ings.  She  deferred  to  Paul's  views  about  women 
preachers  on  Sundays,  she  said  ;  but  on  week-days 
she  had  just  as  much  right  to  snatch  brands  from 
the  burning  as  Paul,  or  Peter,  or  any  other  man. 
She  went  on  like  that,  in  a  breezy,  off-hand  fashion 
which  tickled  the  audience  immensely,  and  led  to 
the  liveliest  anticipations  of  what  would  happen 
when  she  began  upon  the  evening's  harvest  of 
souls. 

But  it  was  something  else  that  happened.  At  a 
signal  from  Sister  Soulsby  the  stewards  got  up, 
and,  in  an  unconcerned  sort  of  way,  went  through 
the  throng  to  the  rear  of  the  church,  locked  the 
doors,  and  put  the  keys  in  their  pockets.  The 
sister  dryly  explained  now  to  the  surprised  con 
gregation  that  there  was  a  season  for  all  things, 

239 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  that  on  the  present  occasion  they  would  sus 
pend  the  glorious  work  of  redeeming  fallen  human 
nature,  and  take  up  instead  the  equally  noble 
task  of  raising  some  fifteen  hundred  dollars  which 
the  church  needed  in  its  business.  The  doors 
would  only  be  opened  again  when  this  had  been 
accomplished. 

The  brethren  were  much  taken  aback  by  this 
trick,  and  they  permitted  themselves  to  exchange 
a  good  many  scowling  and  indignant  glances,  the 
while  their  professional  visitors  sang  another  of 
their  delightfully  novel  sacred  duets.  Its  charm 
of  harmony  for  once  fell  upon  unsympathetic  ears. 
But  then  Sister  Soulsby  began  another  monologue, 
defending  this  way  of  collecting  money,  chaffing 
the  assemblage  with  bright-eyed  impudence  on 
their  having  been  trapped,  and  scoring,  one  after 
another,  neat  and  jocose  little  personal  points  on 
local  characteristics,  at  which  everybody  but  the 
individual  touched  grinned  broadly.  She  was  so 
droll  and  cheeky,  and  withal  effective  in  her  talk, 
that  she  quite  won  the  crowd  over.  She  told  a 
story  about  a  woodchuck  which  fairly  brought 
down  the  house. 

"A  man,"  she  began,  with  a  quizzical  twinkle  in 
her  eye,  "told  me  once  about  hunting  a  wood- 
chuck  with  a  pack  of  dogs,  and  they  chased  it  so 
hard  that  it  finally  escaped  only  by  climbing  a 
butternut-tree.  '  But,  my  friend,'  I  said  to  him, 
'woodchucks  can't  climb  trees,  —  butternut- trees 

240 


I 
THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

or  any  other  kind,  —  and  you  know  it ! '  All  he 
said  in  reply  to  me  was :  '  This  woodchuck  had 
to  climb  a  tree  ! '  And  that 's  the  way  with  this 
congregation.  You  think  you  can't  raise  $1,500, 
but  you  Ve  got  to." 

So  it  went  on.  She  set  them  all  laughing ;  and 
then,  with  a  twist  of  the  eyes  and  a  change  of 
voice,  lo,  and  behold,  she  had  them  nearly  crying 
in  the  same  breath.  Under  the  pressure  of  these 
jumbled  emotions,  brethren  began  to  rise  up  in 
their  pews  and  say  what  they  would  give.  The 
wonderful  woman  had  something  smart  and  apt 
to  say  about  each  fresh  contribution,  and  used  it 
to  screw  up  the  general  interest  a  notch  further 
toward  benevolent  hysteria.  With  songs  and  jokes 
and  impromptu  exhortations  and  prayers  she  kept 
the  thing  whirling,  until  a  sort  of  duel  of  generosity 
began  between  two  of  the  most  unlikely  men,  — 
Erastus  Winch  and  Levi  Gorringe.  Everybody 
had  been  surprised  when  Winch  gave  his  first  $50  ; 
but  when  he  rose  again,  half  an  hour  afterward, 
and  said  that,  owing  to  the  high  public  position  of 
some  of  the  new  members  on  probation,  he  foresaw 
a  great  future  for  the  church,  and  so  felt  moved 
to  give  another  $25,  there  was  general  amazement. 
Moved  by  a  common  instinct,  all  eyes  were  turned 
upon  Levi  Gorringe,  and  he,  without  the  slightest 
hesitation,  stood  up  and  said  he  would  give  $TOO. 
There  was  something  in  his  tone  which  must  have 
annoyed  Brother  Winch,  for  he  shot  up  like  a  dart, 
16  241 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  called  out,  "  Put  me  down  for  fifty  more ;  " 
and  that  brought  Gorringe  to  his  feet  with  an 
added  $50,  and  then  the  two  went  on  raising  each 
Other  till  the  assemblage  was  agape  with  admiring 
stupefaction. 

This  gladiatorial  combat  might  have  been  going 
on  till  now,  the  Sunday-school  superintendent  con 
cluded,  if  Winch  had  n't  subsided.  The  amount 
of  the  contributions  hadn't  been  figured  up  yet, 
for  Sister  Soulsby  kept  the  list;  but  there  had 
been  a  tremendous  lot  of  money  raised.  Of  that 
there  could  be  no  doubt. 

The  Presiding  Elder  now  told  Theron  that  the 
Quarterly  Conference  had  been  adjourned  yester 
day  till  to-day.  He  and  Brother  Davis  were  even 
now  on  their  way  to  attend  the  session  in  the 
church  next  door.  The  Elder  added,  with  an 
obvious  kindly  significance,  that  though  Theron 
was  too  ill  to  attend  it,  he  guessed  his  absence 
would  do  him  no  harm.  Then  the  two  men  left 
the  room,  and  Theron  went  to  sleep  again. 

Another  almost  blank  period  ensued,  this  time 
lasting  for  forty- eight  hours.  The  young  minister 
was  enfolded  in  the  coils  of  a  fever  of  some  sort, 
which  Brother  Soulsby,  who  had  dabbled  consider 
ably  in  medicine,  admitted  that  he  was  puzzled 
about.  Sometimes  he  thought  that  it  was  typhoid, 
and  then  again  there  were  symptoms  which  looked 
suspiciously  like  brain  fever.  The  Methodists  of 
Octavius  counted  no  physician  among  their  num- 

242 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

bers,  and  when,  on  the  second  day,  Alice  grew 
scared,  and  decided,  with  Brother  Soulsby's  assent, 
to  call  in  professional  advice,  the  only  doctor's 
name  she  could  recall  was  that  of  Ledsmar.  She 
was  conscious  of  an  instinctive  dislike  for  the  vague 
image  of  him  her  fancy  had  conjured  up,  but  the 
reflection  that  he  was  Theron's  friend,  and  so 
probably  would  be  more  moderate  in  his  charges, 
decided  her. 

Brother  Soulsby  showed  a  most  comforting  tact 
and  swiftness  of  apprehension  when  Alice,  in  men 
tioning  Dr.  Ledsmar's  name,  disclosed  by  her  man 
ner  a  fear  that  his  being  sent  for  would  create 
talk  among  the  church  people.  He  volunteered 
at  once  to  act  as  messenger  himself,  and,  with  no 
better  guide  than  her  dim  hints  at  direction, 
found  the  doctor  and  brought  him  back  to  the 
parsonage. 

Dr.  Ledsmar  expressly  disclaimed  to  Soulsby  all 
pretence  of  professional  skill,  and  made  him  under 
stand  that  he  went  along  solely  because  he  liked 
Mr.  Ware,  and  was  interested  in  him,  and  in  any 
case  would  probably  be  of  as  much  use  as  the 
wisest  of  strange  physicians,  —  a  view  which  the 
little  revivalist  received  with  comprehending  nods 
of  tacit  acquiescence.  Ledsmar  came,  and  was 
taken  up  to  the  sick-room.  He  sat  on  the  bed 
side  and  talked  with  Theron  awhile,  and  then 
went  downstairs  again.  To  Alice's  anxious  inqui 
ries,  he  replied  that  it  seemed  to  him  merely  a 

243 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

case  of  over-work  and  over-worry,  about  which 
there  was  not  the  slightest  occasion  for  alarm. 

"But  he  says  the  strangest  things,"  the  wife  put 
in.  "  He  has  been  quite  delirious  at  times." 

"  That  means  only  that  his  brain  is  taking  a  rest 
as  well  as  his  body,"  remarked  Ledsmar.  "  That 
is  Nature's  way  of  securing  an  equilibrium  of  re 
pose —  of  recuperation.  He  will  come  out  of  it 
with  his  mind  all  the  fresher  and  clearer." 

"  I  don't  believe  he  knows  shucks  !  "  was  Alice's 
comment  when  she  closed  the  street  door  upon 
Dr.  Ledsmar.  "  Anybody  could  have  come  in  and 
looked  at  a  sick  man  and  said, '  Leave  him  alone.' 
You  expect  something  more  from  a  doctor.  It 's 
his  business  to  say  what  to  do.  And  I  suppose 
he  '11  charge  two  dollars  for  just  telling  me  that 
my  husband  was  resting  !  " 

"  No,"  said  Brother  Soulsby,  "  he  said  he  never 
practised,  and  that  he  would  come  only  as  a 
friend." 

"  Well,  it  is  n't  my  idea  of  a  friend,  —  not  to 
prescribe  a  single  thing,"  protested  Alice. 

Yet  it  seemed  that  no  prescription  was  needed, 
after  all.  The  next  morning  Theron  woke  to  find 
himself  feeling  quite  restored  in  spirits  and  nerves. 
He  sat  up  in  bed,  and  after  an  instant  of  weakly 
giddiness,  recognized  that  he  was  all  right  again. 
Greatly  pleased,  he  got  up,  and  proceeded  to 
dress  himself.  There  were  little  recurring  hints 
of  faintness  and  vertigo,  while  he  was  shaving,  but 

244 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

he  had  the  sense  to  refer  these  to  the  fact  that  he 
was  very,  very  hungry.  He  went  downstairs,  and 
smiled  with  the  pleased  pride  of  a  child  at  the 
surprise  which  his  appearance  at  the  door  created. 
Alice  and  the  Soulsbys  were  at  breakfast.  He 
joined  them,  and  ate  voraciously,  declaring  that  it 
was  worth  a  month's  illness  to  have  things  taste  so 
good  once  more. 

"You  still  look  white  as  a  sheet,"  said  Alice, 
warningly.  "  If  I  were  you,  I  'd  be  careful  in  my 
diet  for  a  spell  yet." 

For  answer,  Theron  let  Sister  Soulsby  help  him 
again  to  ham  and  eggs.  He  talked  exclusively  to 
Sister  Soulsby,  or  rather  invited  her  by  his  manner 
to  talk  to  him,  and  listened  and  watched  her  with 
indolent  content.  There  was  a  sort  of  happy  and 
purified  languor  in  his  physical  and  mental  being, 
which  needed  and  appreciated  just  this,  —  to  sit 
next  a  bright  and  attractive  woman  at  a  good 
breakfast,  and  be  ministered  to  by  her  sprightly 
conversation,  by  the  flash  of  her  informing  and 
inspiring  eyes,  and  the  nameless  sense  of  sup 
port  and  repose  which  her  near  proximity  exhaled. 
He  felt  himself  figuratively  leaning  against  Sister 
Soulsby's  buoyant  personality,  and  resting. 

Brother  Soulsby,  like  the  intelligent  creature  he 
was,  ate  his  breakfast  in  peace ;  but  Alice  would 
interpose  remarks  from  time  to  time.  Theron  was 
conscious  of  a  certain  annoyance  at  this,  and  knew 
that  he  was  showing  it  by  an  exaggerated  display 

245 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

of  interest  in  everything  Sister  Soulsby  said,  and 
persisted  in  it.  There  trembled  in  the  background 
of  his  thoughts  ever  and  again  the  recollection  of 
a  grievance  against  his  wife,  — an  offence  which  she 
had  committed,  —  but  he  put  it  aside  as  something 
to  be  grappled  and  dealt  with  when  he  felt  again 
like  taking  up  the  serious  and  disagreeable  things 
of  life.  For  the  moment,  he  desired  only  to  be 
amused  by  Sister  Soulsby.  Her  casual  mention 
of  the  fact  that  she  and  her  husband  were  taking 
their  departure  that  very  day,  appealed  to  him  as 
an  added  reason  for  devoting  his  entire  attention 
to  her. 

"You  mustn't  forget  that  famous  talking-to  you 
threatened  me  with,  —  that  •'  regular  hoeing-over,' 
you  know,"  he  reminded  her,  when  he  found  him 
self  alone  with  her  after  breakfast.  He  smiled  as 
he  spoke,  in  frank  enjoyment  of  the  prospect. 

Sister  Soulsby  nodded,  and  aided  with  a  roll  of 
her  eyes  the  effect  of  mock-menace  in  her  uplifted 
forefinger.  "  Oh,  never  fear,"  she  cried.  "  You  '11 
catch  it  hot  and  strong.  But  that  '11  keep  till  after 
noon.  Tell  me,  do  you  feel  strong  enough  to  go 
in  next  door  and  attend  the  trustees'  meeting  this 
forenoon?  It 's  rather  important  that  you  should 
be  there,  if  you  can  spur  yourself  up  to  it.  By  the 
way,  you  have  n't  asked  what  happened  at  the 
Quarterly  Conference  yesterday." 

Theron  sighed,  and  made  a  little  grimace  of 
repugnance.  "  If  you  knew  how  little  I  cared  !  " 

246 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

he  said.  "  I  did  hope  you  'd  forget  all  about  men 
tioning  that,  —  and  everything  else  connected  with 
—  the  next  door.  You  talk  so  much  more  inter 
estingly  about  other  things." 

"  Here  's  gratitude  for  you  !  "  exclaimed  Sister 
Soulsby,  with  a  gay  simulation  of  despair.  "  Why, 
man  alive,  do  you  know  what  I  Ve  done  for  you  ? 
I  got  around  on  the  Presiding  Elder's  blind  side, 
I  captured  old  Pierce,  I  wound  Winch  right  around 
my  little  finger,  I  worked  two  or  three  of  the  class- 
leaders  —  all  on  your  account.  The  result  was  you 
went  through  as  if  you  'd  had  your  ears  pinned 
back,  and  been  greased  all  over.  You  Ve  got  an 
extra  hundred  dollars  added  to  your  salary;  do 
you  hear?  On  the  sixth  question  of  the  order  of 
business  the  Elder  ruled  that  the  recommendation 
of  the  last  conference's  estimating  committee  could 
be  revised  (between  ourselves  he  was  wrong,  but 
that  does  n't  matter) ,  and  so  you  're  in  clover. 
And  very  friendly  things  were  said  about  you, 
too." 

"  It  was  very  kind  of  you,"  said  Theron.  "  I  am 
really  extremely  grateful  to  you."  He  shook  her 
by  the  hand  to  make  up  for  what  he  realized  to  be 
a  lack  of  fervor  in  his  tones. 

"  Well,  then,"  Sister  Soulsby  replied,  "  you  pull 
yourself  together,  and  take  your  place  as  chairman 
of  the  trustees'  meeting,  and  see  to  it  that,  what 
ever  comes  up,  you  side  with  old  Pierce  and 
Winch." 

247 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  Oh,  they  're  my  friends  now,  are  they?  "  asked 
Theron,  with  a  faint  play  of  irony  about  his  lips. 

"Yes,  that's  your  ticket  this  election,"  she 
answered  briskly,  "  and  mind  you  vote  it  straight. 
Don't  bother  about  reasons  now.  Just  take  it 
from  me,  as  the  song  says,  <  that  things  have 
changed  since  Willie  died.'  That 's  all.  And 
then  come  back  here,  and  this  afternoon  we  '11 
have  a  good  old-fashioned  jaw." 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Ware,  walking  with  ostentatious 
feebleness,  and  forcing  a  conventional  smile  upon 
his  wan  face,  duly  made  his  unexpected  appear 
ance  at  the  trustees'  meeting  in  one  of  the  smaller 
class-rooms.  He  received  their  congratulations 
gravely,  and  shook  hands  with  all  three.  It  re 
quired  an  effort  to  do  this  impartially,  because, 
upon  sight  of  Levi  Gorringe,  there  rose  up  sud 
denly  within  him  an  emotion  of  fierce  dislike  and 
enmity.  In  some  enigmatic  way  his  thoughts  had 
kept  themselves  away  from  Gorringe  ever  since 
Sunday  evening.  Now  they  concentrated  with 
furious  energy  and  swiftness  upon  him.  Theron 
seemed  able  in  a  flash  of  time  to  co-ordinate  many 
recollections  of  Gorringe,  —  the  early  liking  Alice 
had  professed  for  him,  the  mystery  of  those  pur 
chased  plants  in  her  garden,  the  story  of  the  girl 
he  had  lost  in  church,  his  offer  to  lend  him  money, 
the  way  in  which  he  had  sat  beside  Alice  at  the 
love-feast  and  followed  her  to  the  altar-rail  in 
the  evening.  These  raced  abreast  through  the 

248 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

young  minister's  brain,  yet  with  each  its  own 
image,  and  its  relation  to  the  others  clearly 
defined. 

He  found  the  nerve,  all  the  same,  to  take  this 
third  trustee  by  the  hand,  and  to  thank  him  for 
his  congratulations,  and  even  to  say,  with  a  sur 
face  smile  of  welcome,  "It  is  Brother  Gorringe, 
now,  I  remember." 

The  work  before  the  meeting  was  chiefly  of  a 
routine  kind.  In  most  places  this  would  have 
been  transacted  by  the  stewards ;  but  in  Octavius 
these  minor  officials  had  degenerated  into  mere 
ceremonial  abstractions,  who  humbly  ratified,  or  by 
arrangement  anticipated,  the  will  of  the  powerful, 
mortgage- owning  trustees.  Theron  sat  languidly 
at  the  head  of  the  table  while  these  common 
place  matters  passed  in  their  course,  noting  the 
intonations  of  Gorringe's  voice  as  he  read  from 
his  secretary's  book,  and  finding  his  ear  displeased 
by  them.  No  issue  arose  upon  any  of  these  trivial 
affairs,  and  the  minister,  feeling  faint  and  weary  in 
the  heat,  wondered  why  Sister  Soulsby  had  insisted 
on  his  coming. 

All  at  once  he  sat  up  straight,  with  an  instinc 
tive  warning  in  his  mind  that  here  was  the  thing. 
Gorringe  had  4aken  up  the  subject  of  the  "debt- 
raising  "  evening,  and  read  out  its  essentials  as 
they  had  been  embodied  in  a  report  of  the  stew 
ards.  The  gross  sum  obtained,  in  cash  and  prom 
ises,  was  $1,560.  The  stewards  had  collected  of 

249 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

this  a  trifle  less  than  half,  but  hoped  to  get  it  all 
in  during  the  ensuing  quarter.  There  were,  also, 
the  bill  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Soulsby  for  $150,  and  the 
increases  of  $100  in  the  pastor's  salary  and  $25 
in  the  apportioned  contribution  of  the  charge 
toward  the  Presiding  Elder's  maintenance,  the 
two  latter  items  of  which  the  Quarterly  Confer 
ence  had  sanctioned. 

"  I  want  to  hear  the  names  of  the  subscribers 
and  their  amounts  read  out,"  put  in  Brother 
Pierce. 

When  this  was  done,  it  became  apparent  that 
much  more  than  half  of  the  entire  amount  had 
been  offered  by  two  men.  Levi  Gorringe's  $450 
and  Erastus  Winch's  $425  left  only  $690  to  be 
divided  up  among  some  seventy  or  eighty  other 
members  of  the  congregation. 

Brother  Pierce  speedily  stopped  the  reading  of 
these  subordinate  names.  "  They  're  of  no  concern 
whatever,"  he  said,  despite  the  fact  that  his  own 
might  have  been  reached  in  time.  "  Those  first 
names  are  what  I  was  getting  at.  Have  those  two 
first  amounts,  the  big  ones,  be'n  paid?" 

"  One  has  —  the  other  not,"  replied  Gorringe. 

"./V^-cisely,"  remarked  the  senior  trustee. 
"  And  I  'm  goin'  to  move  that  it  need  n't  be  paid, 
either.  When  Brother  Winch,  here,  began  hollerin' 
out  those  extra  twenty-fives  and  fifties,  that  even 
ing,  it  was  under  a  complete  misapprehension. 
He  'd  be'n  on  the  cheese  board  that  same  Mon- 

250 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

day  afternoon,  and  he  'd  done  what  he  thought 
was  a  mighty  big  stroke  of  business,  and  he  felt 
liberal  according.  I  know  just  what  that  feelin'  is 
myself.  If  I  'd  be'n  makin'  a  mint  o'  money, 
instead  o'  losin'  all  the  while,  as  I  do,  I  'd  'a'  done 
just  the  same.  But  the  next  day,  lo,  and  behold, 
Brother  Winch  found  that  it  was  all  a  mistake,  — 
he  had  n't  made  a  single  penny." 

"  Fact  is,  I  lost  by  the  whole  transaction,"  put 
in  Erastus  Winch,  defiantly. 

"Just  so,"  Brother  Pierce  went  on.  "He  lost 
money.  You  have  his  own  word  for  it.  Well, 
then,  I  say  it  would  be  a  burning  shame  for  us  to 
consent  to  touch  one  penny  of  what  he  offered  to 
give,  in  the  fulness  of  his  heart,  while  he  was 
laborin'  under  that  delusion.  And  I  move  he  be 
not  asked  for  it.  We  've  got  quite  as  much  as  we 
need,  without  it.  I  put  my  motion." 

"That  is,  you  don't  put  it,"  suggested  Winch, 
correctingly.  "  You  move  it,  and  Brother  Ware, 
whom  we  're  all  so  glad  to  see  able  to  come  and 
preside,  —  he  '11  put  it." 

There  was  a  moment's  silence.  "  You  've  heard 
the  motion,"  said  Theron,  tentatively,  and  then 
paused  for  possible  remarks.  He  was  not  going 
to  meddle  in  this  thing  himself,  and  Gorringe  was 
the  only  other  who  might  have  an  opinion  to  offer. 
The  necessities  of  the  situation  forced  him  to 
glance  at  the  lawyer  inquiringly.  He  did  so,  and 
turned  his  eyes  away  again  like  a  shot.  Gorringe 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

was  looking  him  squarely  in  the  face,  and  the  look 
was  freighted  with  satirical  contempt. 

The  young  minister  spoke  between  clinched 
teeth.  "  All  those  in  favor  will  say  Aye." 

Brothers  Pierce  and  Winch  put  up  a  simulta 
neous  and  confident  "  Aye." 

"  No,  you  don't !  "  interposed  the  lawyer,  with 
deliberate,  sneering  emphasis.  "  I  decidedly  pro 
test  against  Winch's  voting.  He  's  directly  inter 
ested,  and  he  must  n't  vote.  Your  chairman  knows 
that  perfectly  well." 

"  Yes,  I  think  Brother  Winch  ought  not  to  vote," 
decided  Theron,  with  great  calmness.  He  saw 
now  what  was  coming,  and  underneath  his  surface 
composure  there  were  sharp  flutterings. 

"  Very  well,  then,"  said  Gorringe.  "  I  vote  No, 
and  it 's  a  tie.  It  rests  with  the  chairman  now  to 
cast  the  deciding  vote,  and  say  whether  this  inter 
esting  arrangement  shall  go  through  or  not." 

"Me?"  said  Theron,  eying  the  lawyer  with  a 
cool  self-control  which  had  come  all  at  once  to 
him.  "  Me  ?  Oh,  I  vote  Aye." 


252 


CHAPTER   XVII 

"WELL,  I  did  what  you  told  me  to  do,"  Theron 
Ware  remarked  to  Sister  Soulsby,  when  at  last  they 
found  themselves  alone  in  the  sitting-room  after 
the  midday  meal. 

It  had  taken  not  a  little  strategic  skirmishing  to 
secure  the  room  to  themselves,  for  the  hospitable 
Alice,  much  touched  by  the  thought  of  her  new 
friend's  departure  that  very  evening,  had  gladly 
proposed  to  let  all  the  work  stand  over  until  night, 
and  devote  herself  entirely  to  Sister  Soulsby. 
When,  finally,  Brother  Soulsby  conceived  and  deftly 
executed  the  coup  of  interesting  her  in  the  budding 
of  roses,  and  then  leading  her  off  into  the  garden 
to  see  with  her  own  eyes  how  it  was  done,  Theron 
had  a  sense  of  being  left  alone  with  a  co-conspira 
tor.  The  notion  impelled  him  to  plunge  at  once 
into  the  heart  of  their  mystery. 

"  I  did  what  you  told  me  to  do,"  he  repeated, 
looking  up  from  his  low  easy-chair  to  where  she 
sat  by  the  desk ;  "  and  I  dare  say  you  won't  be 
surprised  when  I  add  that  I  have  no  respect  for 
myself  for  doing  it." 

"  And  yet  you  would  go  and  do  it  right  over 
again,  eh?  "  the  woman  said,  in  bright,  pert  tones, 

253 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

nodding  her  head,  and  smiling  at  him  with  roguish, 
comprehending  eyes.  "  Yes,  that 's  the  way  we  're 
built.  We  spend  our  lives  doing  that  sort  of 
thing." 

"  I  don't  know  that  you  would  precisely  grasp 
my  meaning,"  said  the  young  minister,  with  a 
polite  effort  in  his  words  to  mask  the  untoward 
side  of  the  suggestion.  "  It  is  a  matter  of  con 
science  with  me ;  and  I  am  pained  and  shocked 
at  myself." 

Sister  Soulsby  drummed  for  an  absent  moment 
with  her  thin,  nervous  fingers  on  the  desk-top. 
"  I  guess  maybe  you  'd  better  go  and  lie  down 
again,"  she  said  gently.  "  You  're  a  sick  man, 
still,  and  it's  no  good  your  worrying  your  head  just 
now  with  things  of  this  sort.  You  '11  see  them  dif 
ferently  when  you  're  quite  yourself  again." 

"  No,  no,"  pleaded  Theron.  "  Do  let  us  have 
our  talk  out !  I  'm  all  right.  My  mind  is  clear  as 
a  bell.  Truly,  I  've  really  counted  on  this  talk 
with  you." 

"  But  there  's  something  else  to  talk  about,  is  n't 
there,  besides — besides  your  conscience?"  she 
asked.  Her  eyes  bent  upon  him  a  kindly  pressure 
as  she  spoke,  which  took  all  possible  harshness  from 
her  meaning. 

Theron  answered  the  glance  rather  than  her 
words.  "  I  know  that  you  are  my  friend,"  he  said 
simply. 

Sister  Soulsby  straightened  herself,  and  looked 

254 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

down  upon  him  with  a  new  intentness.  "  Well, 
then,"  she  began,  "let's  thrash  this  thing  out  right 
now,  and  be  done  with  it.  You  say  it 's  hurt  your 
conscience  to  do  just  one  little  hundredth  part  of 
what  there  was  to  be  done  here.  Ask  yourself 
what  you  mean  by  that.  Mind,  I  'm  not  quarrel 
ling,  and  I  'm  not  thinking  about  anything  except 
just  your  own  state  of  mind.  You  think  you  soiled 
your  hands  by  doing  what  you  did.  That  is  to 
say,  you  wanted  all  the  dirty  work  done  by  other 
people.  That 's  it,  is  n't  it  ?  " 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Ware  sat  up,  in  turn,  and  looked 
doubtingly  into  his  companion's  face. 

"  Oh,  we  were  going  to  be  frank,  you  know,"  she 
added,  with  a  pleasant  play  of  mingled  mirth  and 
honest  liking  in  her  eyes. 

'•  No,"  he  said,  picking  his  words,  "  my  point 
would  rather  be  that  —  that  there  ought  not  to 
have  been  any  of  what  you  yourself  call  this  —  this 
'  dirty  work.'  That  is  my  feeling." 

"  Now  we  're  getting  at  it,"  said  Sister  Soulsby, 
briskly.  "  My  dear  friend,  you  might  just  as  well 
say  that  potatoes  are  unclean  and  unfit  to  eat 
because  manure  is  put  into  the  ground  they  grow 
in.  Just  look  at  the  case.  Your  church  here  was 
running  behind  every  year.  Your  people  had  got 
into  a  habit  of  putting  in  nickels  instead  of  dimes, 
and  letting  you  sweat  for  the  difference.  That 's  a 
habit,  like  tobacco,  or  biting  your  finger-nails,  or 
anything  else.  Either  you  were  all  to  come  to 

255 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

smash  here,  or  the  people  had  to  be  shaken  up, 
stood  on  their  heads,  broken  of  their  habit.  It 's 
my  business  —  mine  and  Soulsby's  —  to  do  that 
sort  of  thing.  We  came  here  and  we  did  it,  — 
did  it  up  brown,  too.  We  not  only  raised  all  the 
money  the  church  needs,  and  to  spare,  but  I  took 
a  personal  shine  to  you,  and  went  out  of  my  way 
to  fix  up  things  for  you.  It  is  n't  only  the  extra 
hundred  dollars,  but  the  whole  tone  of  the  congre 
gation  is  changed  toward  you  now.  You  '11  see 
that  they  '11  be  asking  to  have  you  back  here,  next 
spring.  And  you  're  solid  with  your  Presiding 
Elder,  too.  Well,  now,  tell  me  straight,  —  is  that 
worth  while,  or  not?  " 

"  I  've  told  you  that  I  am  very  grateful," 
answered  the  minister,  aand  I  say  it  again,  and 
I  shall  never  be  tired  of  repeating  it.  But  —  but 
it  was  the  means  I  had  in  mind." 

"  Quite  so,"  rejoined  the  sister,  patiently.  "  If 
you  saw  the  way  a  hotel  dinner  was  cooked,  you 
would  n't  be  able  to  stomach  it.  Did  you  ever  see 
a  play?  In  a  theatre,  I  mean.  I  supposed  not. 
But  you  '11  understand  when  I  say  that  the  per 
formance  looks  one  way  from  where  the  audience 
sit,  and  quite  a  different  way  when  you  are  behind 
the  scenes.  There  you  see  that  the  trees  and 
houses  are  cloth,  and  the  moon  is  tissue  paper, 
and  the  flying  fairy  is  a  middle-aged  woman  strung 
up  on  a  rope.  That  does  n't  prove  that  the  play, 
out  in  front,  is  n't  beautiful  and  affecting,  and  all 

256 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

that.  It  only  shows  that  everything  in  this  world 
is  produced  by  machinery  —  by  organization. 
The  trouble  is  that  you  've  been  let  in  on  the 
stage,  behind  the  scenes,  so  to  speak,  and  you  're 
so  green  —  if  you  '11  pardon  me  —  that  you  want  to 
sit  down  and  cry  because  the  trees  are  cloth,  and 
the  rnoon  is  a  lantern.  And  /  say,  Don't  be  such 
a  goose  !" 

"  I  see  what  you  mean,"  Theron  said,  with  an 
answering  smile.  He  added,  more  gravely,  "  All 
the  same,  the  Winch  business  seems  to  me  —  " 

"  Now  the  Winch  business  is  my  own  affair," 
Sister  Soulsby  broke  in  abruptly.  "  I  take  all  the 
responsibility  for  that.  You  need  know  nothing 
about  it.  You  simply  voted  as  you  did  on  the  merits 
of  the  case  as  he  presented  them,  —  that 's  all." 

"But  — "  Theron  began,  and  then  paused. 
Something  had  occurred  to  him,  and  he  knitted 
his  brows  to  follow  its  course  of  expansion  in  his 
mind.  Suddenly  he  raised  his  head.  "  Then  you 
arranged  with  Winch  to  make  those  bogus  offers 
—  just  to  lead  others  on?"  he  demanded. 

Sister  Soulsby's  large  eyes  beamed  down  upon 
him  in  reply,  at  first  in  open  merriment,  then  more 
soberly,  till  their  regard  was  almost  pensive. 

"  Let  us  talk  of  something  else,"  she  said.  "  All 
that  is  past  and  gone.  It  has  nothing  to  do  with 
you,  anyway.  I  've  got  some  advice  to  give  you 
about  keeping  up  this  grip  you  Ve  got  on  your 
people." 

17  257 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

The  young  minister  had  risen  to  his  feet  while 
she  spoke.  He  put  his  hands  in  his  pockets,  and 
with  rounded  shoulders  began  slowly  pacing  the 
room.  After  a  turn  or  two  he  came  to  the  desk, 
and  leaned  against  it. 

"  I  doubt  if  it 's  worth  while  going  into  that,"  he 
said,  in  the  solemn  tone  of  one  who  feels  that  an 
irrevocable  thing  is  being  uttered.  She  waited  to 
hear  more,  apparently.  "  I  think  I  shall  go  away 
—  give  up  the  ministry,"  he  added. 

Sister  Soulsby's  eyes  revealed  no  such  shock  of 
consternation  as  he,  unconsciously,  had  looked  for. 
They  remained  quite  calm ;  and  when  she  spoke, 
they  deepened,  to  fit  her  speech,  with  what  he  read 
to  be  a  gaze  of  affectionate  melancholy,  —  one 
might  say  pity.  She  shook  her  head  slowly. 

"  No  —  don't  let  any  one  else  hear  you  say 
that,"  she  replied.  "  My  poor  young  friend,  it 's 
no  good  to  even  think  it.  The  real  wisdom  is  to 
school  yourself  to  move  along  smoothly,  and  not 
fret,  and  get  the  best  of  what 's  going.  I  Ve 
known  others  who  felt  as  you  do,  —  of  course 
there  are  times  when  every  young  man  of  brains 
and  high  notions  feels  that  way,  —  but  there  's  no 
help  for  it.  Those  who  tried  to  get  out  only 
broke  themselves.  Those  who  stayed  in,  and 
made  the  best  of  it  —  well,  one  of  them  will  be  a 
bishop  in  another  ten  years." 

Theron  had  started  walking  again.  "But  the 
moral  degradation  of  it !"  he  snapped  out  at  her, 

258 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

over  his  shoulder.     "  I  'd  rather  earn  the  meanest 
living,  at  an  honest  trade,  and  be  free  from  it." 

"  That  may  all  be,"  responded  Sister  Soulsby. 
"  But  it  is  n't  a  question  of  what  you  'd  rather  do. 
It 's  what  you  can  do.  How  could  you  earn  a 
living?  What  trade  or  business  do  you  suppose 
you  could  take  up  now,  and  get  a  living  out  of? 
Not  one,  my  man,  not  one." 

Theron  stopped  and  stared  at  her.  This  view 
of  his  capabilities  came  upon  him  with  the  force 
and  effect  of  a  blow. 

"  I  don't  discover,  myself,"  he  began  stum- 
blingly,  "  that  I  'm  so  conspicuously  inferior  to  the 
men  I  see  about  me  who  do  make  livings,  and 
very  good  ones,  too." 

"  Of  course  you  're  not,"  she  replied  with  easy 
promptness ;  "  you  're  greatly  the  other  way,  or  I 
shouldn't  be  taking  this  trouble  with  you.  But 
you  're  what  you  are  because  you  're  where  you  are. 
The  moment  you  try  on  being  somewhere  else, 
you  're  done  for.  In  all  this  world  nobody  else 
comes  to  such  unmerciful  and  universal  grief  as 
the  unfrocked  priest." 

The  phrase  sent  Theron's  fancy  roving.  "  I 
know  a  Catholic  priest,"  he  said  irrelevantly,  "who 
doesn't  believe  an  atom  in  —  in  things." 

"Very  likely,"  said  Sister  Soulsby.  "Most  of 
us  do.  But  you  don't  hear  him  talking  about 
going  and  earning  his  living,  I  '11  bet !  Or  if  he 
does,  he  takes  powerful  good  care  not  to  go,  all  the 

259 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

same.  They  Ve  got  horse-sense,  those  priests. 
They  're  artists,  too.  They  know  how  to  allow  for 
the  machinery  behind  the  scenes." 

"But  it's  all  so  different,"  urged  the  young 
minister ;  "  the  same  things  are  not  expected  of 
them.  Now  I  sat  the  other  night  and  watched 
those  people  you  got  up  around  the  altar-rail, 
groaning  and  shouting  and  crying,  and  the  others 
jumping  up  and  down  with  excitement,  and  Sister 
Lovejoy  —  did  you  see  her?  —  coming  out  of  her 
pew  and  regularly  waltzing  in  the  aisle,  with  her 
eyes  shut,  like  a  whirling  dervish  —  I  positively 
believe  it  was  all  that  made  me  ill.  I  could  n't 
stand  it.  I  can't  stand  it  now.  I  won't  go  back 
to  it !  Nothing  shall  make  me  !  " 

"  Oh-h,  yes,  you  will,"  she  rejoined  sooth 
ingly.  "  There  's  nothing  else  to  do.  Just  put  a 
good  face  on  it,  and  make  up  your  mind  to  get 
through  by  treading  on  as  few  corns  as  possible, 
and  keeping  your  own  toes  well  in,  and  you  '11  be 
surprised  how  easy  it  '11  all  come  to  be.  You  were 
speaking  of  the  revival  business.  Now  that  ex 
emplifies  just  what  I  was  saying,  —  it  's  a  part  of  our 
machinery.  Now  a  church  is  like  everything  else, 
—  it 's  got  to  have  a  boss,  a  head,  an  authority  of 
some  sort,  that  people  will  listen  to  and  mind. 
The  Catholics  are  different,  as  you  say.  Their 
church  is  chuck-full  of  authority,  —  all  the  way  from 
the  Pope  down  to  the  priest,  —  and  accordingly 
they  do  as  they  're  told.  But  the  Protestants,  — 

260 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

your  Methodists  most  of  all,  —  they  say  '  No,  we 
won't  have  any  authority,  we  won't  obey  any  boss.' 
Very  well,  what  happens  ?  We  who  are  responsible 
for  running  the  thing,  and  raising  the  money  and 
so  on,  —  we  have  to  put  on  a  spurt  every  once  in  a 
while,  and  work  up  a  general  state  of  excitement ; 
and  while  it 's  going,  don't  you  see  that  that  is  the 
authority,  the  motive  power,  whatever  you  like  to 
call  it,  by  which  things  are  done  ?  Other  denomi 
nations  don't  need  it.  We  do,  and  that  's  why 
we  Ve  got  it." 

"But  the  mean  dishonesty  of  it  all!"  Theron 
broke  forth.  He  moved  about  again,  his  bowed 
face  drawn  as  with  bodily  suffering.  "  The  low 
born  tricks,  the  hypocrisies  !  I  feel  as  if  I  could 
never  so  much  as  look  at  these  people  here  again 
without  disgust." 

"  Oh,  now  that 's  where  you  make  your  mis 
take,"  Sister  Soulsby  put  in  placidly.  "  These 
people  of  yours  are  not  a  whit  worse  than  other 
people.  They  Ve  got  their  good  streaks  and  their 
bad  streaks,  just  like  the  rest  of  us.  Take  them 
by  and  large,  they  're  quite  on  a  par  with  other 
folks  the  whole  country  through." 

"  I  don't  believe  there  's  another  congregation 
in  the  Conference  where  —  where  this  sort  of 
thing  would  have  been  needed,  or,  I  might  say, 
tolerated,"  insisted  Theron. 

"  Perhaps  you  're  right,"  the  other  assented ; 
"but  that  only  shows  that  your  people  here  are 

261 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

different  from  the  others  —  not  that  they  're  worse. 
You  don't  seem  to  realize  :  Octavius,  so  far  as  the 
Methodists  are  concerned,  is  twenty  or  thirty  years 
behind  the  times.  Now  that  has  its  advantages 
and  its  disadvantages.  The  church  here  is  tough 
and  coarse,  and  full  of  grit,  like  a  grindstone  ; 
and  it  does  ministers  from  other  more  niminy- 
piminy  places  all  sorts  of  good  to  come  here  once 
in  a  while  and  rub  themselves  up  against  it.  It 
scours  the  rust  and  mildew  off  from  their  piety, 
and  they  go  back  singing  and  shouting.  But  of 
course  it 's  had  a  different  effect  with  you.  You  're 
razor-steel  instead  of  scythe-steel,  and  the  grind 
ing  's  been  too  rough  and  violent  for  you.  But 
you  see  what  I  mean.  These  people  here  really 
take  their  primitive  Methodism  seriously.  To 
them  the  profession  of  entire  sanctification  is  truly  a 
genuine  thing.  Well,  don't  you  see,  when  people 
just  know  that  they  're  saved,  it  does  n't  seem  to 
them  to  matter  so  much  what  they  do.  They  feel 
that  ordinary  rules  may  well  be  bent  and  twisted 
in  the  interest  of  people  so  supernaturally  good  as 
they  are.  That 's  pure  human  nature.  It 's  always 
been  like  that." 

Theron  paused  in  his  walk  to  look  absently  at 
her.  "That  thought,"  he  said,  in  a  vague,  slow 
way,  "  seems  to  be  springing  up  in  my  path, 
whichever  way  I  turn.  It  oppresses  me,  and  yet 
it  fascinates  me,  —  this  idea  that  the  dead  men 
have  known  more  than  we  know,  done  more 

262 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

than  we  do ;  that  there  is  nothing  new  any 
where  ;  that —  " 

"  Never  mind  the  dead  men,"  interposed  Sister 
Soulsby.  "  Just  you  come  and  sit  down  here.  I 
hate  to  have  you  straddling  about  the  room  when 
I  'm  trying  to  talk  to  you." 

Theron  obeyed,  and  as  he  sank  into  the  low 
seat,  Sister  Soulsby  drew  up  her  chair,  and  put  her 
hand  on  his  shoulder.  Her  gaze  rested  upon  his 
with  impressive  steadiness. 

"  And  now  I  want  to  talk  seriously  to  you,  as  a 
friend,"  she  began.  "  You  must  n't  breathe  to  any 
living  soul  the  shadow  of  a  hint  of  this  nonsense 
about  leaving  the  ministry.  I  could  see  how  you 
were  feeling,  —  I  saw  the  book  you  were  reading 
the  first  time  I  entered  this  room,  —  and  that 
made  me  like  you ;  only  I  expected  to  find  you 
mixing  up  more  worldly  gumption  with  your 
Renan.  Well,  perhaps  I  like  you  all  the  better 
for  not  having  it  —  for  being  so  delightfully  fresh. 
At  any  rate,  that  made  me  sail  in  and  straighten 
your  affairs  for  you.  And  now,  for  God's  sake, 
keep  them  straight.  Just  put  all  notions  of  any 
thing  else  out  of  your  head.  Watch  your  chief 
men  and  women,  and  be  friends  with  them. 
Keep  your  eye  open  for  what  they  think  you 
ought  to  do,  and  do  it.  Have  your  own  ideas  as 
much  as  you  like,  read  what  you  like,  say  '  Damn  ' 
under  your  breath  as  much  as  you  like,  but  don't 
let  go  of  your  job.  I  Ve  knocked  about  too  much, 

263 


and  I  Ve  seen  too  many  promising  young  fellows 
cut  their  own  throats  for  pure  moonshine,  not  to 
have  a  right  to  say  that." 

Theron  could  not  be  insensible  to  the  friendly 
hand  on  his  shoulder,  or  to  the  strenuous  sincerity 
of  the  voice  which  thus  adjured  him. 

"  Well,"  he  said  vaguely,  smiling  up  into  her 
earnest  eyes,  "if  we  agree  that  it  is  moonshine." 

"  See  here  !  "  she  exclaimed,  with  renewed  ani 
mation,  patting  his  shoulder  in  a  brisk,  automatic 
way,  to  point  the  beginnings  of  her  confidences  : 
"  I  '11  tell  you  something.  It 's  about  myself. 
I  Ve  got  a  religion  of  my  own,  and  it 's  got  just 
one  plank  in  it,  and  that  is  that  the  time  to  sepa 
rate  the  sheep  from  the  goats  is  on  Judgment 
Day,  and  that  it  can't  be  done  a  minute  before." 

The  young  minister  took  in  the  thought,  and 
turned  it  about  in  his  mind,  and  smiled  upon  it. 

"  And  that  brings  me  to  what  I  'm  going  to  tell 
you,"  Sister  Soulsby  continued.  She  leaned  back  in 
her  chair,  and  crossed  her  knees  so  that  one  well- 
shaped  and  artistically  shod  foot  poised  itself  close 
to  Theron's  hand.  Her  eyes  dwelt  upon  his  face 
with  an  engaging  candor. 

"  I  began  life,"  she  said,  "as  a  girl  by  running 
away  from  a  stupid  home  with  a  man  that  I  knew 
was  married  already.  After  that,  I  supported  my 
self  for  a  good  many  years,  —  generally,  at  first,  on 
the  stage.  I  Ve  been  a  front-ranker  in  Amazon 
ballets,  and  I  Ve  been  leading  lady  in  comic  opera 

264 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

companies  out  West.  I  've  told  fortunes  in  one 
room  of  a  mining- camp  hotel  where  the  biggest 
game  of  faro  in  the  Territory  went  on  in  another. 
I  've  been  a  professional  clairvoyant,  and  I  Ve  been 
a  professional  medium,  and  I  've  been  within  one 
vote  of  being  indicted  by  a  grand  jury,  and  the 
money  that  bought  that  vote  was  put  up  by  the 
smartest  and  most  famous  train-gambler  between 
Omaha  and  'Frisco,  a  gentleman  who  died  in  his 
boots  and  took  three  sheriff's  deputies  along  with 
him  to  Kingdom-Come.  Now,  that 's  my  record." 

Theron  looked  earnestly  at  her,  and  said  nothing. 

"  And  now  take  Soulsby,  "  she  went  on.  "  Of 
course  I  take  it  for  granted  there  's  a  good  deal 
that  he  has  never  felt  called  upon  to  mention. 
He  has  n't  what  you  may  call  a  talkative  tempera 
ment.  But  there  is  also  a  good  deal  that  I  do 
know.  He  's  been  an  actor,  too,  and  to  this  day 
I  'd  back  him  against  Edwin  Booth  himself  to 
recite  '  Clarence's  Dream.'  And  he  's  been  a 
medium,  and  then  he  was  a  travelling  phrenologist, 
and  for  a  long  time  he  was  advance  agent  for  a 
British  Blondes  show,  and  when  I  first  saw  him  he 
was  lecturing  on  female  diseases  —  and  he  had 
his  little  turn  with  a  grand  jury  too.  In  fact,  he 
was  what  you  may  call  a  regular  bad  old  rooster." 

Again  Theron  suffered  the  pause  to  lapse  with 
out  comment,  —  save  for  an  amorphous  sort  of 
conversation  which  he  felt  to  be  going  on  between 
his  eyes  and  those  of  Sister  Soulsby. 

265 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"Well,  then,"  she  resumed,  "so  much  for  us 
apart.  Now  about  us  together.  We  liked  each 
other  from  the  start.  We  compared  notes,  and 
we  found  that  we  had  both  soured  on  living  by 
fakes,  and  that  we  were  tired  of  the  road,  and 
wanted  to  settle  down  and  be  respectable  in  our 
old  age.  We  had  a  little  money,  —  enough  to  see 
us  through  a  year  or  two.  Soulsby  had  always 
hungered  and  longed  to  own  a  garden  and  raise 
flowers,  and  had  never  been  able  to  stay  long 
enough  in  one  place  to  see  so  much  as  a  bean-pod 
ripen.  So  we  took  a  little  place  in  a  quiet  coun 
try  village  down  on  the  Southern  Tier,  and  he 
planted  everything  three  deep  all  over  the  place, 
and  I  bought  a  roomful  of  cheap  good  books, 
and  we  started  in.  We  took  to  it  like  ducks  to 
water  for  a  while,  and  I  don't  say  that  we  could  n't 
have  stood  it  out,  just  doing  nothing,  to  this  very 
day ;  but  as  luck  would  have  it,  during  the  first 
winter  there  was  a  revival  at  the  local  Methodist 
church,  and  we  went  every  evening,  —  at  first  just 
to  kill  time,  and  then  because  we  found  we  liked 
the  noise  and  excitement  and  general  racket  of  the 
thing.  After  it  was  all  over  each  of  us  found  that 
the  other  had  been  mighty  near  going  up  to  the 
rail  and  joining  the  mourners.  And  another  thing 
had  occurred  to  each  of  us,  too,  —  that  is,  what 
tremendous  improvements  there  were  possible  in 
the  way  that  amateur  revivalist  worked  up  his 
business.  This  stuck  in  our  crops,  and  we  figured 

266 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

on  it  all  through  the  winter.  —  Well,  to  make  a  long 
story  short,  we  finally  went  into  the  thing  ourselves." 

"  Tell  me  one  thing,"  interposed  Theron.  •  "  I  'm 
anxious  to  understand  it  all  as  we  go  along. 
Were  you  and  he  at  any  time  sincerely  converted? 
—  that  is,  I  mean,  genuinely  convicted  of  sin 
and  conscious  of  —  you  know  what  I  mean  !  " 

"  Oh,  bless  you,  yes,"  responded  Sister  Soulsby. 
"  Not  only  once  —  dozens  of  times  —  I  may  say 
every  time.  We  could  n't  do  good  work  if  we 
were  n't.  But  that 's  a  matter  of  temperament  — 
of  emotions." 

"  Precisely.  That  was  what  I  was  getting  at," 
explained  Theron. 

"  Well,  then,  hear  what  /  was  getting  at,"  she 
went  on.  "You  were  talking  very  loudly  here 
about  frauds  and  hypocrisies  and  so  on,  a  few 
minutes  ago.  Now  /  say  that  Soulsby  and  I  do 
good,  and  that  we  're  good  fellows.  Now  take 
him,  for  example.  There  is  n't  a  better  citizen  in 
all  Chemung  County  than  he  is,  or  a  kindlier 
neighbor,  or  a  better  or  more  charitable  man. 
I  've  known  him  to  stay  up  a  whole  winter's  night 
in  a  poor  Irishman's  stinking  and  freezing  stable, 
trying  to  save  his  cart-horse  for  him,  that  had 
been  seized  with  some  sort  of  fit.  The  man's 
whole  livelihood,  and  his  family's,  was  in  that 
horse ;  and  when  it  died,  Soulsby  bought  him  an 
other,  and  never  told  even  me  about  it.  Now  that 
I  call  real  piety,  if  you  like." 

267 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  So  do  I,"  put  in  Theron,  cordially. 

"And  this  question  of  fraud,"  pursued  his  com 
panion,  —  "  look  at  it  in  this  light.  You  heard  us 
sing.  Well,  now,  I  was  a  singer,  of  course,  but 
Soulsby  hardly  knew  one  note  from  another.  I 
taught  him  to  sing,  and  he  went  at  it  patiently  and 
diligently,  like  a  little  man.  And  I  invented  that 
scheme  of  finding  tunes  which  the  crowd  did  n't 
know,  and  so  could  n't  break  in  on  and  smother. 
I  simply  took  Chopin,  —  he  is  full  of  sixths,  you 
know,  —  and  I  got  all  sorts  of  melodies  out  of  his 
waltzes  and  mazurkas  and  nocturnes  and  so  on, 
and  I  trained  Soulsby  just  to  sing  those  sixths  so 
as  to  make  the  harmony,  and  there  you  are.  He 
could  n't  sing  by  himself  any  more  than  a  crow, 
but  he  's  got  those  sixths  of  his  down  to  a  hair. 
Now  that 's  machinery,  management,  organization. 
We  take  these  tunes,  written  by  a  devil-may-care 
Pole  who  was  living  with  George  Sand  openly  at 
the  time,  and  pass  'em  off  on  the  brethren  for 
hymns.  It 's  a  fraud,  yes  ;  but  it 's  a  good  fraud. 
So  they  are  all  good  frauds.  I  say  frankly  that 
I  'm  glad  that  the  change  and  the  chance  came  to 
help  Soulsby  and  me  to  be  good  frauds." 

"  And  the  point  is  that  I  'm  to  be  a  good  fraud, 
too,"  commented  the  young  minister. 

She  had  risen,  and  he  got  to  his  feet  as  well. 
He  instinctively  sought  for  her  hand,  and  pressed 
it  warmly,  and  held  it  in  both  his,  with  an  exuber 
ance  of  gratitude  and  liking  in  his  manner. 

268 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Sister  Soulsby  danced  her  eyes  at  him  with  a 
saucy  little  shake  of  the  head.  "  I  'm  afraid  you  '11 
never  make  a  really  good  fraud,"  she  said.  "You 
have  n't  got  it  in  you.  Your  intentions  are  all  right, 
but  your  execution  is  hopelessly  clumsy.  I  came 
up  to  your  bedroom  there  twice  while  you  were 
sick,  just  to  say  '  howdy,'  and  you  kept  your  eyes 
shut,  and  all  the  while  a  blind  horse  could  have 
told  that  you  were  wide  awake." 

"  I  must  have  thought  it  was  my  wife,"  said 
Theron. 


269 


PART   III 


CHAPTER   XVIII 

WHEN  the  lingering  dusk  finally  settled  down 
upon  this  long  summer  evening,  the  train  bearing 
the  Soulsbys  homeward  was  already  some  score  of 
miles  on  its  way,  and  the  Methodists-  of  Octavius 
had  nearly  finished  their  weekly  prayer-meeting. 

After  the  stirring  events  of  the  revival,  it  was 
only  to  be  expected  that  this  routine,  home-made 
affair  should  suffer  from  a  reaction.  The  attend 
ance  was  larger  than  usual,  perhaps,  but  the  pro 
ceedings  were  spiritless  and  tame.  Neither  the 
pastor  nor  his  wife  was  present  at  the  beginning,  and 
the  class-leader  upon  whom  control  devolved  made 
but  feeble  headway  against  the  spell  of  inertia  which 
the  hot  night-air  laid  upon  the  gathering.  Long 
pauses  intervened  between  the  perfunctory  praise- 
offerings  and  supplications,  and  the  hymns  weariedly 
raised  from  time  to  time  fell  again  in  languor  by 
the  wayside. 

Alice  came  in  just  as  people  were  beginning  to 
hope  that  some  one  would  start  the  Doxology, 

270 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  bring  matters  to  a  close.  Her  appearance 
apparently  suggested  this  to  the  class-leader,  for 
in  a  few  moments  the  meeting  had  been  dismissed, 
and  some  of  the  members,  on  their  way  out,  were 
shaking  hands  with  their  minister's  wife,  and  ex 
pressing  the  polite  hope  that  he  was  better.  The 
worried  look  in  her  face,  and  the  obvious  stains  of 
recent  tears  upon  her  cheeks  imparted  an  added 
point  and  fervor  to  these  inquiries,  but  she  replied 
to  all  in  tones  of  studied  tranquillity  that,  although 
not  feeling  well  enough  to  attend  prayer-meeting, 
Brother  Ware  was  steadily  recovering  strength,  and 
confidently  expected  to  be  in  complete  health  by 
Sunday.  They  left  her,  and  could  hardly  wait  to 
get  into  the  vestibule  to  ask  one  another  in  whis 
pers  what  on  earth  she  could  have  been  crying 
about. 

Meanwhile  Brother  Ware  improved  his  conva 
lescent  state  by  pacing  slowly  up  and  down  under 
the  elms  on  the  side  of  the  street  opposite  the 
Catholic  church.  There  were  no  houses  here  for 
a  block  and  more ;  the  sidewalk  was  broken  in 
many  places,  so  that  passers-by  avoided  it ;  the 
overhanging  boughs  shrouded  it  all  in  obscurity ; 
it  was  pre-eminently  a  place  to  be  alone  in. 

Theron  had  driven  to  the  depot  with  his  guests 
an  hour  before,  and  after  a  period  of  pleasant 
waiting  on  the  platform,  had  said  good-bye  to  them 
as  the  train  moved  away.  Then  he  turned  to 
Alice,  who  had  also  accompanied  them  in  the  car- 

271 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

riage,  and  was  conscious  of  a  certain  annoyance  at 
her  having  come.  That  long  familiar  talk  of  the 
afternoon  had  given  him  the  feeling  that  he  was 
entitled  to  bid  farewell  to  Sister  Soulsby : —  to  both 
the  Soulsbys  —  by  himself. 

"  I  am  afraid  folks  will  think  it  strange  —  neither 
of  us  attending  the  prayer-meeting,"  he  said,  with 
a  suggestion  of  reproof  in  his  tone,  as  they  left  the 
station-yard. 

"  If  we  get  back  in  time,  I  '11  run  in  for  a  min 
ute,"  answered  Alice,  with  docility. 

"No  —  no,"  he  broke  in.  "I'm  not  equal  to 
walking  so  fast.  You  rim  on  ahead,  and  explain 
matters,  and  I  will  come  along  slowly." 

"The  hack  we  came  in  is  still  there  in  the 
yard,"  the  wife  suggested.  "  We  could  drive  home 
in  that.  I  don't  believe  it  would  cost  more  than 
a  quarter  —  and  if  you  're  feeling  badly  — " 

"  But  I  am  not  feeling  badly,"  Theron  replied, 
with  frank  impatience.  "  Only  I  feel  —  I  feel 
that  being  alone  with  my  thoughts  would  be  good 
for  me." 

"  Oh,  certainly  —  by  all  means  !  "  Alice  had 
said,  and  turned  sharply  on  her  heel. 

Being  alone  with  these  thoughts,  Theron  strolled 
aimlessly  about,  and  did  not  think  at  all.  The 
shadows  gathered,  and  fireflies  began  to  disclose 
their  tiny  gleams  among  the  shrubbery  in  the  gar 
dens.  A  lamp-lighter  came  along,  and  passed 
him,  leaving  in  his  wake  a  straggling  double  line 

272 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

of  lights,  glowing  radiantly  against  the  black-green 
of  the  trees.  This  recalled  to  Theron  that  he  had 
heard  that  the  town  council  lit  the  street  lamps 
by  the  almanac,  and  economized  gas  when  moon 
shine  was  due.  The  idea  struck  him  as  droll,  and 
he  dwelt  upon  it  in  various  aspects,  smiling  at  some 
of  its  comic  possibilities.  Looking  up  in  the  mid 
dle  of  one  of  these  whimsical  conceits,  the  sport 
ive  impulse  died  suddenly  within  him.  He  real 
ized  that  it  was  dark,  and  that  the  massive  black 
bulk  reared  against  the  sky  on  the  other  side  of 
the  road  was  the  Catholic  church.  The  other  fact, 
that  he  had  been  there  walking  to  and  fro  for 
some  time,  was  borne  in  upon  him  more  slowly. 
He  turned,  and  resumed  the  pacing  up  and  down 
with  a  still  more  leisurely  step,  musing  upon  the 
curious  way  in  which  people's  minds  all  uncon 
sciously  follow  about  where  instincts  and  intuitions 
lead. 

No  doubt  it  was  what  Sister  Soulsby  had  said 
about  Catholics  which  had  insensibly  guided  his 
purposeless  stroll  in  this  direction.  What  a 
woman  that  was  !  Somehow  the  purport  of  her 
talk — striking,  and  even  astonishing  as  he  had 
found  it  —  did  not  stand  out  so  clearly  in  his 
memory  as  did  the  image  of  the  woman  herself. 
She  must  have  been  extremely  pretty  once.  For 
that  matter  she  still  was  a  most  attractive-looking 
woman.  It  had  been  a  genuine  pleasure  to  have 
her  in  the  house  —  to  see  her  intelligent  responsive 
18  273 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

face  at  the  table  —  to  have  it  in  one's  power  to 
make  drafts  at  will  upon  the  fund  of  sympathy  and 
appreciation,  of  facile  mirth  and  ready  tenderness 
in  those  big  eyes  of  hers.  He  liked  that  phrase 
she  had  used  about  herself,  —  "a  good  fellow." 
It  seemed  to  fit  her  to  a  "  t."  And  Soulsby  was 
a  good  fellow  too.  All  at  once  it  occurred  to  him 
to  wonder  whether  they  were  married  or  not. 

But  really  that  was  no  affair  of  his,  he  reflected. 
A  citizen  of  the  intellectual  world  should  be  above 
soiling  his  thoughts  with  mean  curiosities  of  that 
sort,  and  he  drove  the  impertinent  query  down 
again  under  the  surface  of  his  mind.  He  refused 
to  tolerate,  as  well,  sundry  vagrant  imaginings  which 
rose  to  cluster  about  and  literalize  the  romance  of 
her  youth  which  Sister  Soulsby  had  so  frankly  out 
lined.  He  would  think  upon  nothing  but  her  as 
he  knew  her,  —  the  kindly,  quick-witted,  capable 
and  charming  woman  who  had  made  such  a  bril 
liant  break  in  the  monotony  of  life  at  that  dull 
parsonage  of  his.  The  only  genuine  happiness  in 
life  must  consist  in  having  bright,  smart,  attractive 
women  like  that  always  about. 

The  lights  were  visible  now  in  the  upper  rooms 
of  Father  Forbes'  pastorate  across  the  way.  Theron 
paused  for  a  second  to  consider  whether  he  wanted 
to  go  over  and  call  on  the  priest.  He  decided  that 
mentally  he  was  too  fagged  and  flat  for  such  an 
undertaking.  He  needed  another  sort  of  com 
panionship,  —  some  restful,  soothing  human  con- 

274 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

tact,  which  should  exact  nothing  from  him  in 
return,  but  just  take  charge  of  him,  with  soft? 
wise  words  and  pleasant  plays  of  fancy,  and  jokes 
and  —  and  —  something  of  the  general  effect  cre 
ated  by  Sister  Soulsby's  eyes.  The  thought  ex 
panded  itself,  and  he  saw  that  he  had  never 
realized  before,  —  nay,  never  dreamt  before  — 
what  a  mighty  part  the  comradeship  of  talented, 
sweet-natured  and  beautiful  women  must  play  in 
the  development  of  genius,  the  achievement  of 
lofty  aims,  out  in  the  great  world  of  great  men. 
To  know  such  women  —  ah,  that  would  never 
fall  to  his  hapless  lot. 

The  priest's  lamps  blinked  at  him  through  the 
trees.  He  remembered  that  priests  were  sup 
posed  to  be  even  further  removed  from  the  pos 
sibilities  of  such  contact  than  he  was  himself. 
His  memory  reverted  to  that  horribly  ugly  old 
woman  whom  Father  Forbes  had  spoken  of  as  his 
housekeeper.  Life  under  the  same  roof  with  such 
a  hag  must  be  even  worse  than  —  worse  than  — 

The  young  minister  did  not  finish  the  compari 
son,  even  in  the  privacy  of  his  inner  soul.  He 
stood  instead  staring  over  at  the  pastorate,  in  a 
kind  of  stupor  of  arrested  thought.  The  figure 
of  a  woman  passed  in  view  at  the  nearest  win 
dow  —  a  tall  figure  with  pale  summer  clothes  of 
some  sort,  and  a  broad  summer  hat,  —  a  flitting 
effect  of  diaphanous  shadow  between  him  and 
the  light  which  streamed  from  the  casement. 

275 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Theron  felt  a  little  shiver  run  over  him,  as  if  the 
delicate  coolness  of  the  changing  night-air  had  got 
into  his  blood.  The  window  was  open,  and  his 
strained  hearing  thought  it  caught  the  sound  of 
faint  laughter.  He  continued  to  gaze  at  the 
place  where  the  vision  had  appeared,  the  while  a 
novel  and  strange  perception  unfolded  itself  upon 
his  mind. 

He  had  come  there  in  the  hope  of  encountering 
Celia  Madden. 

Now  that  he  looked  this  fact  in  the  face,  there 
was  nothing  remarkable  about  it.  In  truth,  it  was 
simplicity  itself.  He  was  still  a  sick  man,  weak  in 
body  and  dejected  in  spirits.  The  thought  of  how 
unhappy  and  unstrung  he  was  came  to  him  now 
with  an  insistent  pathos  that  brought  tears  to  his 
eyes.  He  was  only  obeying  the  universal  law  of 
nature,  —  the  law  which  prompts  the  pallid  spind 
ling  sprout  of  the  potato  in  the  cellar  to  strive 
feebly  toward  the  light. 

From  where  he  stood  in  the  darkness  he 
stretched  out  his  hands  in  the  direction  of  that 
open  window.  The  gesture  was  his  confession  to 
the  overhanging  boughs,  to  the  soft  night-breeze, 
to  the  stars  above,  —  and  it  bore  back  to  him  some 
thing  of  the  confessional's  vague  and  wistful  solace. 
He  seemed  already  to  have  drawn  down  into  his 
soul  a  taste  of  the  refreshment  it  craved.  He 
sighed  deeply,  and  the  hot  moisture  smarted 
again  upon  his  eyelids,  but  this  time  not  all  in 

276 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

grief.  With  his  tender  compassion  for  himself 
there  mingled  now  a  flutter  of  buoyant  prescience, 
of  exquisite  expectancy. 

Fate  walked  abroad  this  summer  night.  The 
street  door  of  the  pastorate  opened,  and  in  the 
flood  of  illumination  which  spread  suddenly  forth 
over  the  steps  and  sidewalk,  Theron  saw  again  the 
tall  form,  with  the  indefinitely  light- hued  flowing 
garments  and  the  wide  straw  hat.  He  heard  a 
tuneful  woman's  voice  call  out  "  Good-night, 
Maggie,"  and  caught  no  response  save  the  abrupt 
closing  of  the  door,  which  turned  everything  black 
again  with  a  bang.  He  listened  acutely  for  another 
instant,  and  then  with  long,  noiseless  strides  made 
his  way  down  his  deserted  side  of  the  street.  He 
moderated  his  pace  as  he  turned  to  cross  the  road 
at  the  corner,  and  then,  still  masked  by  the  trees, 
halted  altogether,  in  a  momentary  tumult  of  appre 
hension.  No  —  yes — it  was  all  right.  The  girl 
sauntered  out  from  the  total  darkness  into  the 
dim  starlight  of  the  open  corner. 

"  Why,  bless  me,  is  that  you,  Miss  Madden  ?  " 

Celia  seemed  to  discern  readily  enough,  through 
the  accents  of  surprise,  the  identity  of  the  tall, 
slim  man  who  addressed  her  from  the  shadows. 

"  Good-evening,  Mr.  Ware,"  she  said,  with 
prompt  affability.  "  I  'm  so  glad  to  find  you  out 
again.  We  heard  you  were  ill." 

"  I  have  been  very  ill,"  responded  Theron,  as 
they  shook  hands  and  walked  on  together.  He 

277 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

added,  with  a  quaver  in  his  voice,  "  I  am  still  far 
from  strong.  I  really  ought  not  to  be  out  at  all. 
But  —  but  the  longing  for  —  for  —  well,  I  couldn't 
stay  in  any  longer.  Even  if  it  kills  me,  I  shall  be 
glad  I  came  out  to-night." 

"  Oh,  we  won't  talk  of  killing,"  said  Celia.  "  I 
don't  believe  in  illnesses  myself." 

"But  you  believe  in  collapses  of  the  nerves," 
put  in  Theron,  with  gentle  sadness,  "  in  moral  and 
spiritual  and  mental  breakdowns.  I  remember  how 
I  was  touched  by  the  way  you  told  me  you  suffered 
from  them.  I  had  to  take  what  you  said  then  for 
granted.  I  had  had  no  experience  of  it  myself. 
But  now  I  know  what  it  is."  He  drew  a  long, 
pathetic  sigh.  "Oh,  don't  I  know  what  it  is  !  " 
he  repeated  gloomily. 

"  Come,  my  friend,  cheer  up,"  Celia  purred  at 
him,  in  soothing  tones.  He  felt  that  there  was 
a  deliciously  feminine  and  sisterly  intuition  in 
her  speech,  and  in  the  helpful,  nurse-like  way  in 
which  she  drew  his  arm  through  hers.  He  leaned 
upon  this  support,  and  was  glad  of  it  in  every 
fibre  of  his  being. 

"  Do  you  remember?  You  promised  —  that  last 
time  I  saw  you  —  to  play  for  me,"  he  reminded 
her.  They  were  passing  the  little  covered  postern 
door  at  the  side  and  rear  of  the  church  as  he  spoke, 
and  he  made  a  half  halt  to  point  the  coincidence. 

"  Oh,  there  's  no  one  to  blow  the  organ,"  she 
said,  divining  his  suggestion.  "  And  I  have  n't 

278 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  key  —  and,  besides,  the  organ  is  too  heavy 
and  severe  for  an  invalid.  It  would  overwhelm 
you  to-night." 

"Not  as  you  would  know  how  to  play  it  for  me," 
urged  Theron,  pensively.  "  I  feel  as  if  good  music 
to-night  would  make  me  well  again.  I  am  really 
very  ill  and  weak  —  and  unhappy  !  " 

The  girl  seemed  moved  by  the  despairing  note 
in  his  voice.  She  invited  him  by  a  sympathetic 
gesture  to  lean  even  more  directly  on  her  arm. 

"  Come  home  with  me,  and  I  '11  play  Chopin  to 
you,"  she  said, in  compassionate  friendliness.  "He 
is  the  real  medicine  for  bruised  and  wounded 
nerves.  You  shall  have  as  much  of  him  as  you 
like." 

The  idea  thus  unexpectedly  thrown  forth  spread 
itself  like  some  vast  and  inexpressibly  alluring  vista 
before  Theron's  imagination.  The  spice  of  adven 
ture  in  it  fascinated  his  rnind  as  well,  but  for  a 
shrinking  moment  the  flesh  was  weak. 

"I'm  afraid  your  people  would  —  would  think 
it  strange,"  he  faltered  —  and  began  also  to  recall 
that  he  had  some  people  of  his  own  who  would  be 
even  more  amazed. 

"  Nonsense,"  said  Celia,  in  fine,  bold  confidence, 
and  with  a  reassuring  pressure  on  his  arm.  "  I 
allow  none  of  my  people  to  question  what  I  do. 
They  never  dream  of  such  a  preposterous  thing. 
Besides,  you  will  see  none  of  them.  Mrs.  Madden 
is  at  the  seaside,  and  my  father  and  brother  have 

279 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

their  own  part  of  the  house.  I  sha'n't  listen  for  a 
minute  to  your  not  coming.  Come,  I  'm  your 
doctor.  I  'm  to  make  you  well  again." 

There  was  further  conversation,  and  Theron 
more  or  less  knew  that  he  was  bearing  a  part  in 
it,  but  his  whole  mind  seemed  concentrated,  in  a 
sort  of  delicious  terror,  upon  the  wonderful  expe 
rience  to  which  every  footstep  brought  him  nearer. 
His  magnetized  fancy  pictured  a  great  spacious 
parlor,  such  as  a  mansion  like  the  Maddens'  would 
of  course  contain,  and  there  would  be  a  grand 
piano,  and  lace  curtains,  and  paintings  in  gold 
frames,  and  a  chandelier,  and  velvet  easy-chairs, 
and  he  would  sit  in  one  of  these,  surrounded  by 
all  the  luxury  of  the  rich,  while  Celia  played  to 
him.  There  would  be  servants  about,  he  pre 
sumed,  and  very  likely  they  would  recognize  him, 
and  of  course  they  would  talk  about  it  to  Tom, 
Dick,  and  Harry  afterward.  But  he  said  to  him 
self  defiantly  that  he  did  n't  care. 

He  withdrew  his  arm  from  hers  as  they  came 
upon  the  well-lighted  main  street.  He  passed  no 
one  who  seemed  to  know  him.  Presently  they 
came  to  the  Madden  place,  and  Celia,  without 
waiting  for  the  gravelled  walk,  struck  obliquely 
across  the  lawn.  Theron,  who  had  been  lagging 
behind  with  a  certain  circumspection,  stepped 
briskly  to  her  side  now.  Their  progress  over  the 
soft,  close -cropped  turf  in  the  dark  together,  with 
the  scent  of  lilies  and  perfumed  shrubs  heavy  on 

280 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  night  air,  and  the  majestic  bulk  of  the  big 
silent  house  rising  among  the  trees  before  them, 
gave  him  a  thrilling  sense  of  the  glory  of  individual 
freedom. 

"  I  feel  a  new  man  already,"  he  declared,  as 
they  swung  along  on  the  grass.  He  breathed  a 
long  sigh  of  content,  and  drew  nearer,  so  that 
their  shoulders  touched  now  and  again  as  they 
walked.  In  a  minute  more  they  were  standing  on 
the  doorstep,  and  Theron  heard  the  significant 
jingle  of  a  bunch  of  keys  which  his  companion 
was  groping  for  in  her  elusive  pocket.  He  was 
conscious  of  trembling  a  little  at  the  sound. 

It  seemed  that,  unlike  other  people,  the  Mad 
dens  did  not  have  their  parlor  on  the  ground- 
floor,  opening  off  the  front  hall.  Theron  stood 
in  the  complete  darkness  of  this  hall,  till  Celia  had 
lit  one  of  several  candles  which  were  in  their  hand- 
sticks  on  a  sort  of  sideboard  next  the  hat-rack. 
She  beckoned  him  with  a  gesture  of  her  head,  and 
he  followed  her  up  a  broad  staircase,  magnificent 
in  its  structural  appointments  of  inlaid  woods,  and 
carpeted  with  what  to  his  feet  felt  like  down. 
The  tiny  light  which  his  guide  bore  before  her 
half  revealed,  as  they  passed  in  their  ascent,  tall 
lengths  of  tapestry,  and  the  dull  glint  of  armor 
and  brazen  discs  in  shadowed  niches  on  the  nearer 
wall.  Over  the  stair-rail  lay  an  open  space  of 
such  stately  dimensions,  bounded  by  terminal 
lines  of  decoration  so  distant  in  the  faint  candle- 

281 


THE  DAMNATION   OF  THERON  WARE 

flicker,  that  the  young  country  minister  could 
think  of  no  word  but  "  palatial  "  to  fit  it  all. 

At  the  head  of  the  flight,  Celia  led  the  way 
along  a  wide  corridor  to  where  it  ended.  Here, 
stretched  from  side  to  side,  and  suspended  from 
broad  hoops  of  a  copper-like  metal,  was  a  thick 
curtain,  of  a  uniform  color  which  Theron  at  first 
thought  was  green,  and  then  decided  must  be  blue. 
She  pushed  its  heavy  folds  aside,  and  unlocked 
another  door.  He  passed  under  the  curtain  be 
hind  her,  and  closed  the  door. 

The  room  into  which  he  had  made  his  way  was 
not  at  all  after  the  fashion  of  any  parlor  he  had 
ever  seen.  In  the  obscure  light  it  was  difficult  to 
tell  what  it  resembled.  He  made  out  what  he 
took  to  be  a  painter's  easel,  standing  forth  inde 
pendently  in  the  centre  of  things.  There  were 
rows  of  books  on  rude,  low  shelves.  Against  one 
of  the  two  windows  was  a  big,  flat  writing-table  — 
or  was  it  a  drawing-table  ?  —  littered  with  papers. 
Under  the  other  window  was  a  carpenter's  bench, 
with  a  large  mound  of  something  at  one  end  cov 
ered  with  a  white  cloth.  On  a  table  behind  the 
easel  rose  a  tall  mechanical  contrivance,  the  chief 
feature  of  which  was  a  thick  upright  spiral  screw. 
The  floor  was  of  bare  wood  stained  brown.  The 
walls  of  this  queer  room  had  photographs  and 
pictures,  taken  apparently  from  illustrated  papers, 
pinned  up  at  random  for  their  only  ornament. 

Celia  had  lighted  three  or  four  other  candles  on 

282 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  mantel.  She  caught  the  dumfounded  expres 
sion  with  which  her  guest  was  surveying  his  sur 
roundings,  and  gave  a  merry  little  laugh. 

"  This  is  my  workshop,"  she  explained.  "  I 
keep  this  for  the  things  I  do  badly,  — things  I  fool 
with.  If  I  want  to  paint,  or  model  in  clay,  or 
bind  books,  or  write,  or  draw,  or  turn  on  the 
lathe,  or  do  some  carpentering,  here 's  where  I 
do  it.  All  the  things  that  make  a  mess  which 
has  to  be  cleaned  up  —  they  are  kept  out  here  — 
because  this  is  as  far  as  the  servants  are  allowed 
to  come." 

She  unlocked  still  another  door  as  she  spoke, 
—  a  door  which  was  also  concealed  behind  a 
curtain. 

"  Now,"  she  said,  holding  up  the  candle  so 
that  its  reddish  flare  rounded  with  warmth  the 
creamy  fulness  of  her  chin  and  throat,  and  glowed 
upon  her  hair  in  a  flame  of  orange  light  —  "  now 
I  will  show  you  what  is  my  very  own." 


283 


CHAPTER   XIX 

THERON  WARE  looked  about  him  with  frankly 
undisguised  astonishment. 

The  room  in  which  he  found  himself  was  so 
dark  at  first  that  it  yielded  little  to  the  eye,  and 
that  little  seemed  altogether  beyond  his  compre 
hension.  His  gaze  helplessly  followed  Celia  and 
her  candle  about  as  she  busied  herself  in  the  work 
of  illumination.  When  she  had  finished,  and 
pinched  out  the  taper,  there  were  seven  lights  in 
the  apartment  —  lights  beaming  softly  through 
half-opaque  alternating  rectangles  of  blue  and 
yellow  glass.  They  must  be  set  in  some  sort  of 
lanterns  around  against  the  wall,  he  thought,  but 
the  shape  of  these  he  could  hardly  make  out. 

Gradually  his  sight  adapted  itself  to  this  subdued 
light,  and  he  began  to  see  other  things.  These 
queer  lamps  were  placed,  apparently,  so  as  to 
shed  a  special  radiance  upon  some  statues  which 
stood  in  the  corners  of  the  chamber,  and  upon 
some  pictures  which  were  embedded  in  the  walls. 
Theron  noted  that  the  statues,  the  marble  of 
which  lost  its  aggressive  whiteness  under  the 
tinted  lights,  were  mostly  of  naked  men  and 

284 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

women;  the  pictures,  four  or  five  in  number, 
were  all  variations  of  a  single  theme,  — the  Virgin 
Mary  and  the  Child. 

A  less  untutored  vision  than  his  would  have 
caught  more  swiftly  the  scheme  of  color  and  line 
in  which  these  works  of  art  bore  their  share. 
The  walls  of  the  room  were  in  part  of  flat  upright 
wooden  columns,  terminating  high  above  in  simple 
capitals,  and  they  were  all  painted  in  pale  amber 
and  straw  and  primrose  hues,  irregularly  wavering 
here  and  there  toward  suggestions  of  white.  Be 
tween  these  pilasters  were  broader  panels  of 
stamped  leather,  in  gently  varying  shades  of 
peacock  blue.  These  contrasted  colors  vaguely 
interwove  and  mingled  in  what  he  could  see  of 
the  shadowed  ceiling  far  above.  They  were  re 
peated  in  the  draperies  and  huge  cushions  and 
pillows  of  the  low,  wide  divan  which  ran  about 
three  sides  of  the  room.  Even  the  floor,  where 
it  revealed  itself  among  the  scattered  rugs,  was 
laid  in  a  mosaic  pattern  of  matched  woods,  which, 
like  the  rugs,  gave  back  these  same  shifting  blues 
and  uncertain  yellows. 

The  fourth  side  of  the  apartment  was  broken  in 
outline  at  one  end  by  the  door  through  which 
they  had  entered,  and  at  the  other  by  a  broad, 
square  opening,  hung  with  looped-back  curtains 
of  a  thin  silken  stuff.  Between  the  two  apertures 
rose  against  the  wall  what  Theron  took  at  first 
glance  to  be  an  altar.  There  were  pyramidal  rows 

285 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

of  tall  candles  here  on  either  side,  each  masked 
with  a  little  silken  hood ;  below,  in  the  centre, 
a  shelf-like  projection  supported  what  seemed  a 
massive,  carved  casket,  and  in  the  beautiful  intri 
cacies  of  this,  and  the  receding  canopy  of  delicate 
ornamentation  which  depended  above  it,  the  domi 
nant  color  was  white,  deepening  away  in  its 
shadows,  by  tenderly  minute  gradations,  to  the 
tints  which  ruled  the  rest  of  the  room. 

Celia  lighted  some  of  the  high,  thick  tapers  in 
these  candelabra,  and  opened  the  top  of  the 
casket.  Theron  saw  with  surprise  that  she  had 
uncovered  the  keyboard  of  a  piano.  He  viewed 
with  much  greater  amazement  her  next  proceed 
ing,  —  which  was  to  put  a  cigarette  between  her 
lips,  and,  bending  over  one  of  the  candles  with  it 
for  an  instant,  turn  to  him  with  a  filmy,  opalescent 
veil  of  smoke  above  her  head. 

"  Make  yourself  comfortable  anywhere,"  she  said, 
with  a  gesture  which  comprehended  all  the  divans 
and  pillows  in  the  place.  "  Will  you  smoke? " 

"  I  have  never  tried  since  I  was  a  little  boy," 
said  Theron,  "  but  I  think  I  could.  If  you  don't 
mind,  I  should  like  to  see." 

Lounging  at  his  ease  on  the  oriental  couch, 
Theron  experimented  cautiously  upon  the  unac 
customed  tobacco,  and  looked  at  Celia  with  what 
he  felt  to  be  the  confident  quiet  of  a  man  of  the 
world.  She  had  thrown  aside  her  hat,  and  in  do 
ing  so  had  half  released  some  of  the  heavy  strands 

286 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

of  hair  coiled  at  the  back  of  her  head.  His  glance 
instinctively  rested  upon  this  wonderful  hair  of 
hers.  There  was  no  mistaking  the  sudden  fasci 
nation  its  disorder  had  for  his  eye. 

She  stood  before  him  with  the  cigarette  poised 
daintily  between  thumb  and  finger  of  a  shapely 
hand,  and  smiled  comprehendingly  down  on  her 
guest. 

"  I  suffered  the  horrors  of  the  damned  with  this 
hair  of  mine  when  I  was  a  child,"  she  said.  "  I 
daresay  all  children  have  a  taste  for  persecuting 
red-heads ;  but  it 's  a  specialty  with  Irish  chil 
dren.  They  get  hold  somehow  of  an  ancient 
national  superstition,  or  legend,  that  red  hair  was 
brought  into  Ireland  by  the  Danes.  It 's  been  a 
term  of  reproach  with  us  since  Brian  Boru's  time 
to  call  a  child  a  Dane.  I  used  to  be  pursued  and 
baited  with  it  every  day  of  my  life,  until  the  one 
dream  of  my  ambition  was  to  get  old  enough  to 
be  a  Sister  of  Charity,  so  that  I  might  hide  my 
hair  under  one  of  their  big  beastly  white  linen 
caps.  I  Ve  got  rather  away  from  that  ideal  since, 
I  'm  afraid,"  she  added,  with  a  droll  downward 
curl  of  her  lip. 

"Your  hair  is  very  beautiful,"  said  Theron,  in 
the  calm  tone  of  a  connoisseur. 

"  I  like  it  myself,"  Celia  admitted,  and  blew  a 
little  smoke-ring  toward  him.  "  I  Ve  made  this 
whole  room  to  match  it.  The  colors,  I  mean," 
she  explained,  in  deference  to  his  uplifted  brows. 

287 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  Between  us,  we  make  up  what  Whistler  would 
call  a  symphony.  That  reminds  me  —  I  was  going 
to  play  for  you.  Let  me  finish  the  cigarette  first." 

Theron  felt  grateful  for  her  reticence  about  the 
fact  that  he  had  laid  his  own  aside.  "  I  have 
never  seen  a  room  at  all  like  this,"  he  remarked. 
"  You  are  right ;  it  does  fit  you  perfectly." 

She  nodded  her  sense  of  his  appreciation.  "  It 
is  what  I  like,"  she  said.  "It  expresses  me.  I 
will  not  have  anything  about  me  —  or  anybody 
either  —  that  I  don't  like.  I  suppose  if  an  old 
Greek  could  see  it,  it  would  make  him  sick,  but 
it  represents  what  /  mean  by  being  a  Greek.  It 
is  as  near  as  an  Irishman  can  get  to  it." 

"  I  remember  your  puzzling  me  by  saying  that 
you  were  a  Greek." 

Celia  laughed,  and  tossed  the  cigarette-end 
away.  "  I  'd  puzzle  you  more,  I  'm  afraid,  if  I 
tried  to  explain  to  you  what  I  really  meant  by  it. 
I  divide  people  up  into  two  classes,  you  know,  — 
Greeks  and  Jews.  Once  you  get  hold  of  that 
principle,  all  other  divisions  and  classifications, 
such  as  by  race  or  language  or  nationality,  seem 
pure  foolishness.  It  is  the  only  true  division  there 
is.  It  is  just  as  true  among  negroes  or  wild  In 
dians  who  never  heard  of  Greece  or  Jerusalem, 
as  it  is  among  white  folks.  That  is  the  beauty 
of  it.  It  works  everywhere,  always." 

"Try  it  on  me,"  urged  Theron,  with  a  twinkling 
eye.  "  Which  am  I  ?  " 

288 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"Both,"  said  the  girl,  with  a  merry  nod  of  the 
head.  "  But  now  I  '11  play.  I  told  you  you  were 
to  hear  Chopin.  I  prescribe  him  for  you.  He  is 
the  Greekiest  of  the  Greeks.  There  was  a  nation 
where  all  the  people  were  artists,  where  everybody 
was  an  intellectual  aristocrat,  where  the  Philistine 
was  as  unknown,  as  extinct,  as  the  dodo.  Chopin 
might  have  written  his  music  for  them." 

"  I  am  interested  in  Shopang,"  put  in  Theron, 
suddenly  recalling  Sister  Soulsby's  confidences  as 
to  the  source  of  her  tunes.  "  He  lived  with  — • 
what 's  his  name  —  George  something.  We  were 
speaking  about  him  only  this  afternoon.'* 

Celia  looked  down  into  her  visitor's  face  at  first 
inquiringly,  then  with  a  latent  grin  about  her  lips. 
"  Yes  —  George  something,"  she  said,  in  a  tone 
which  mystified  him. 

The  Rev.  Mr.  Ware  was  sitting  up,  a  minute 
afterward,  in  a  ferment  of  awakened  consciousness 
that  he  had  never  heard  the  piano  played  before. 
After  a  little,  he  noiselessly  rearranged  the  cushions, 
and  settled  himself  again  in  a  recumbent  posture. 
It  was  beyond  his  strength  to  follow  that  first  im 
pulse,  and  keep  his  mind  abreast  with  what  his 
ears  took  in.  He  sighed  and  lay  back,  and  sur 
rendered  his  senses  to  the  mere  unthinking  charm 
of  it  all. 

It  was  the  Fourth  Prelude  that  was  singing  in 
the  air  about  him,  —  a  simple,  plaintive  strain 
wandering  at  will  over  a  surface  of  steady  rhythmic 
19  289 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

movement  underneath,  always  creeping  upward 
through  mysteries  of  sweetness,  always  sinking 
again  in  cadences  of  semi-tones.  With  only  a 
moment's  pause,  there  came  the  Seventh  Waltz, 
—  a  rich,  bold  confusion  which  yet  was  not  con 
fused.  Theron's  ears  dwelt  with  eager  delight 
upon  the  chasing  medley  of  swift,  tinkling  sounds, 
but  it  left  his  thoughts  free. 

From  where  he  reclined,  he  turned  his  head  to 
scrutinize,  one  by  one,  the  statues  in  the  corners. 
No  doubt  they  were  beautiful,  —  for  this  was  a  de 
partment  in  which  he  was  all  humility,  —  and  one 
of  them,  the  figure  of  a  broad-browed,  stately, 
though  thick- waisted  woman,  bending  slightly  for 
ward  and  with  both  arms  broken  off,  was  decently 
robed  from  the  hips  downward.  The  others  were 
not  robed  at  all.  Theron  stared  at  them  with  the 
erratic,  rippling  jangle  of  the  waltz  in  his  ears,  and 
felt  that  he  possessed  a  new  and  disturbing  con 
ception  of  what  female  emancipation  meant  in 
these  later  days.  Roving  along  the  wall,  his  glance 
rested  again  upon  the  largest  of  the  Virgin  pic 
tures,  —  a  full-length  figure  in  sweeping  draperies, 
its  radiant,  aureoled  head  upturned  in  rapt  adora 
tion,  its  feet  resting  on  a  crescent  moon  which 
shone  forth  in  bluish  silver  through  festooned 
clouds  of  cherubs.  The  incongruity  between  the 
unashamed  statues  and  this  serene  incarnation  of 
holy  womanhood  jarred  upon  him  for  the  instant. 
Then  his  mind  went  to  the  piano. 

290 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Without  a  break  the  waltz  had  slowed  and  ex 
panded  into  a  passage  of  what  might  be  church 
music,  an  exquisitely  modulated  and  gently  solemn 
chant,  through  which  a  soft,  lingering  song  roved 
capriciously,  forcing  the  listener  to  wonder  where 
it  was  coming  out,  even  while  it  caressed  and 
soothed  to  repose. 

He  looked  from  the  Madonna  to  Celia.  Be 
yond  the  carelessly  drooping  braids  and  coils  of 
hair  which  blazed  between  the  candles,  he  could 
see  the  outline  of  her  brow  and  cheek,  the  noble 
contour  of  her  lifted  chin  and  full,  modelled  throat, 
all  pink  as  the  most  delicate  roseleaf  is  pink,  against 
the  cool  lights  of  the  altar- like  wall.  The  sight 
convicted  him  in  the  court  of  his  own  soul  as  a 
prurient  and  mean-minded  rustic.  In  the  pres 
ence  of  such  a  face,  of  such  music,  there  ceased 
to  be  any  such  thing  as  nudity,  and  statues  no 
more  needed  clothes  than  did  those  slow,  deep, 
magnificent  chords  which  came  now,  gravely  accu 
mulating  their  spell  upon  him. 

"  It  is  all  singing  !  "  the  player  called  out  to 
him  over  her  shoulder,  in  a  minute  of  rest.  "  That 
is  what  Chopin  does,  —  he  sings  !  " 

She  began,  with  an  effect  of  thinking  of  some 
thing  else,  the  Sixth  Nocturne,  and  Theron  at  first 
thought  she  was  not  playing  anything  in  particular, 
so  deliberately,  haltingly,  did  the  chain  of  charm 
unwind  itself  into  sequence.  Then  it  came  closer 
to  him  than  the  others  had  done.  The  dreamy, 

291 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

wistful,  meditative  beauty  of  it  all  at  once  op 
pressed  and  inspired  him.  He  saw  Celia's  shoul 
ders  sway  under  the  impulse  of  the  rubato  license, 
—  the  privilege  to  invest  each  measure  with  the 
stress  of  the  whole,  to  loiter,  to  weep,  to  run  and 
laugh  at  will,  —  and  the  music  she  made  spoke  to 
him  as  with  a  human  voice.  There  was  the  woo 
ing  sense  of  roses  and  moonlight,  of  perfumes, 
white  skins,  alluring  languorous  eyes,  and  then  — 

"You  know  this  part,  of  course,"  he  heard  her 
say. 

On  the  instant  they  had  stepped  from  the  dark, 
scented,  starlit  garden,  where  the  nightingale  sang, 
into  a  great  cathedral.  A  sombre  and  lofty  an 
them  arose,  and  filled  the  place  with  the  splendor 
of  such  dignified  pomp  of  harmony  and  such  sug 
gestions  of  measureless  choral  power  and  authority 
that  Theron  sat  abruptly  up,  then  was  drawn  re- 
sistlessly  to  his  feet.  He  stood  motionless  in  the 
strange  room,  feeling  most  of  all  that  one  should 
kneel  to  hear  such  music. 

"  This  you  '11  know  too,  —  the  funeral  march 
from  the  Second  Sonata,"  she  was  saying,  before 
he  realized  that  the  end  of  the  other  had  come. 
He  sank  upon  the  divan  again,  bending  forward 
and  clasping  his  hands  tight  around  his  knees. 
His  heart  beat  furiously  as  he  listened  to  the 
weird,  mediaeval  processional,  with  its  wild,  clash 
ing  chords  held  down  in  the  bondage  of  an  orderly 
sadness.  There  was  a  propelling  motion  in  the 

292 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

thing  —  a  sense  of  being  borne  bodily  along  — 
which  affected  him  like  dizziness.  He  breathed 
hard  through  the  robust  portions  of  stern,  vigorous 
noise,  and  rocked  himself  to  and  fro  when,  as  rosy 
morn  breaks  upon  a  storm-swept  night,  the  drums 
are  silenced  for  the  sweet,  comforting  strain  of  sol 
itary  melody.  The  clanging  minor  harmonies  into 
which  the  march  relapses  came  to  their  abrupt 
end.  Theron  rose  once  more,  and  moved  with  a 
hesitating  step  to  the  piano. 

"  I  want  to  rest  a  little,"  he  said,  with  his  hand 
on  her  shoulder. 

"  Whew  !  so  do  I,"  exclaimed  Celia,  letting  her 
hands  fall  with  an  exaggerated  gesture  of  weariness. 
"  The  sonatas  take  it  out  of  one  !  They  are  hide 
ously  difficult,  you  know.  They  are  rarely  played." 

"  I  did  n't  know,"  remarked  Theron.  She 
seemed  not  to  mind  his  hand  upon  her  shoulder, 
and  he  kept  it  there.  "  I  did  n't  know  anything 
about  music  at  all.  What  I  do  know  now  is  that 
—  that  this  evening  is  an  event  in  my  life." 

She  looked  up  at  him  and  smiled.  He  read 
unsuspected  tendernesses  and  tolerances  of  friend 
ship  in  the  depths  of  her  eyes,  which  emboldened 
him  to  stir  the  fingers  of  that  audacious  hand  in  a 
lingering,  caressing  trill  upon  her  shoulder.  '  The 
movement  was  of  the  faintest,  but  having  ventured 
it,  he  drew  his  hand  abruptly  away. 

"  You  are  getting  on,"  she  said  to  him.  There 
was  an  enigmatic  twinkle  in  the  smile  with  which 

293 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

she  continued  to  regard  him.  "  We  are  Helleniz- 
ing  you  at  a  great  rate." 

A  sudden  thought  seemed  to  strike  her.  She 
shifted  her  eyes  toward  vacancy  with  a  swift,  ab 
stracted  glance,  reflected  for  a  moment,  then  let  a 
sparkling  half-wink  and  the  dimpling  beginnings 
of  an  almost  roguish  smile  mark  her  assent  to  the 
conceit,  whatever  it  might  be. 

"I  will  be  with  you  in  a  moment,"  he  heard 
her  say ;  and  while  the  words  were  still  in  his 
ears  she  had  risen  and  passed  out  of  sight  through 
the  broad,  open  doorway  to  the  right.  The  looped 
curtains  fell  together  behind  her.  Presently  a 
mellow  light  spread  over  their  delicately  trans 
lucent  surface,  —  a  creamy,  undulating  radiance 
which  gave  the  effect  of  moving  about  among  the 
myriad  folds  of  the  silk. 

Theron  gazed  at  these  curtains  for  a  little,  then 
straightened  his  shoulders  with  a  gesture  of  de 
cision,  and,  turning  on  his  heel,  went  over  and  ex 
amined  the  statues  in  the  further  corners  minutely. 

"  If  you  would  like  some  more,  I  will  play  you 
the  Berceuse  now." 

Her  voice  came  to  him  with  a  delicious  shock. 
He  wheeled  round  and  beheld  her  standing  at  the 
piano,  with  one  hand  resting,  palm  upward,  on  the 
keys.  She  was  facing  him.  Her  tall  form  was 
robed  now  in  some  shapeless,  clinging  drapery, 
lustrous  and  creamy  and  exquisitely  soft,  like  the 
curtains.  The  wonderful  hair  hung  free  and  luxu- 

294 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

riant  about  her  neck  and  shoulders,  and  glowed 
with  an  intensity  of  fiery  color  which  made  all  the 
other  hues  of  the  room  pale  and  vague.  A  fillet  of 
faint,  sky-like  blue  drew  a  gracious  span  through 
the  flame  of  red  above  her  temples,  and  from  this 
there  rose  the  gleam  of  jewels.  Her  head  inclined 
gently,  gravely,  toward  him,  —  with  the  posture  of 
that  armless  woman  in  marble  he  had  been  study 
ing,  —  and  her  brown  eyes,  regarding  him  from  the 
shadows,  emitted  light. 

"  It  is  a  lullaby,  —  the  only  one  he  wrote,"  she 
said,  as  Theron,  pale-faced  and  with  tightened  lips, 
approached  her.  "  No  —  you  must  n't  stand  there," 
she  added,  sinking  into  the  seat  before  the  instru 
ment  ;  "  go  back  and  sit  where  you  were." 

The  most  perfect  of  lullabies,  with  its  swaying 
abandonment  to  cooing  rhythm,  ever  and  again 
rising  in  ripples  to  the  point  of  insisting  on  some 
thing,  one  knows  not  what,  and  then  rocking, 
melting  away  once  more,  passed,  so  to  speak,  over 
Theron's  head.  He  leaned  back  upon  the  cush 
ions,  and  watched  the  white,  rounded  forearm 
which  the  falling  folds  of  this  strange,  statue-like 
drapery  made  bare. 

There  was  more  that  appealed  to  his  mood  in 
the  Third  Ballade.  It  seemed  to  him  that  there 
were  words  going  along  with  it,  —  incoherent  and 
impulsive  yet  very  earnest  words,  appealing  to  him 
in  strenuous  argument  and  persuasion.  Each  time 
he  almost  knew  what  they  said,  and  strained  after 

295 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

their  meaning  with  a  passionate  desire,  and  then 
there  would  come  a  kind  of  cuckoo  call,  and  every 
thing  would  swing  dancing  off  again  into  a  mock 
ery  of  inconsequence. 

Upon  the  silence  there  fell  the  pure,  liquid, 
mellifluous  melody  of  a  soft-throated  woman  sing 
ing  to  her  lover. 

"  It  is  like  Heine,  —  simply  a  love-poem,"  said 
the  girl,  over  her  shoulder. 

Theron  followed  now  with  all  his  senses,  as  she 
carried  the  Ninth  Nocturne  onward.  The  stormy 
passage,  which  she  banged  finely  forth,  was  in 
truth  a  lover's  quarrel ;  and  then  the  mild,  placid 
flow  of  sweet  harmonies  into  which  the  furore  sank, 
dying  languorously  away  upon  a  silence  all  alive 
with  tender  memories  of  sound,  —  was  that  not 
also  a  part  of  love  ? 

They  sat  motionless  through  a  minute,  —  the 
man  on  the  divan,  the  girl  at  the  piano,  —  and 
Theron  listened  for  what  he  felt  must  be  the  audi 
ble  thumping  of  his  heart. 

Then,  throwing  back  her  head,  with  upturned 
face,  Celia  began  what  she  had  withheld  for  the 
last,  —  the  Sixteenth  Mazurka.  This  strange  for 
eign  thing  she  played  with  her  eyes  closed,  her 
head  tilted  obliquely  so  that  Theron  could  see  the 
rose-tinted,  beautiful  countenance,  framed  as  if 
asleep  in  the  billowing  luxuriance  of  unloosed  au 
burn  hair.  He  fancied  her  beholding  visions  as  she 
wrought  the  music,  —  visions  full  of  barbaric  color 

296 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  romantic  forms.  As  his  mind  swam  along 
with  the  gliding,  tricksy  phantom  of  a  tune,  it 
seemed  as  if  he  too  could  see  these  visions,  —  as 
if  he  gazed  at  them  through  her  eyes. 

It  could  not  be  helped.  He  lifted  himself  noise 
lessly  to  his  feet,  and  stole  with  caution  toward 
her.  He  would  hear  the  rest  of  this  weird,  volup 
tuous  fantasy  standing  thus,  so  close  behind  her 
that  he  could  look  down  upon  her  full,  uplifted 
face,  —  so  close  that,  if  she  moved,  that  glowing 
nimbus  of  hair  would  touch  him. 

There  had  been  some  curious  and  awkward 
pauses  in  this  last  piece,  which  Theron,  by  some 
side  cerebration,  had  put  down  to  her  not  watch 
ing  what  her  fingers  did.  There  came  another  of 
these  pauses  now,  —  an  odd,  unaccountable  halt  in 
what  seemed  the  middle  of  everything.  He  stared 
intently  down  upon  her  statuesque,  dreaming  face 
during  the  hush,  and  caught  his  breath  as  he 
waited.  There  fell  at  last  a  few  faltering  ascend 
ing  notes,  making  a  half-finished  strain,  and  then 
again  there  was  silence. 

Celia  opened  her  eyes,  and  poured  a  direct,  deep 
gaze  into  the  face  above  hers.  Its  pale  lips  were 
parted  in  suspense,  and  the  color  had  faded  from 
its  cheeks. 

"  That  is  the  end,"  she  said,  and,  with  a  turn  of 
her  lithe  body,  stood  swiftly  up,  even  while  the 
echoes  of  the  broken  melody  seemed  panting  in 
the  air  about  her  for  completion. 

297 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Theron  put  his  hands  to  his  face,  and  pressed 
them  tightly  against  eyes  and  brow  for  an  instant. 
Then,  throwing  them  aside  with  an  expansive 
downward  sweep  of  the  arms,  and  holding  them 
clenched,  he  returned  Celia's  glance.  It  was  as 
if  he  had  never  looked  into  a  woman's  eyes 
before. 

"It  carit  be  the  end!"  he  heard  himself  say 
ing,  in  a  low  voice  charged  with  deep  significance. 
He  held  her  gaze  in  the  grasp  of  his  with  impla 
cable  tenacity.  There  was  a  trouble  about  breath 
ing,  and  the  mosaic  floor  seemed  to  stir  under  his 
feet.  He  clung  defiantly  to  the  one  idea  of  not 
releasing  her  eyes. 

"  How  could  it  be  the  end  ? "  he  demanded, 
lifting  an  uncertain  hand  to  his  breast  as  he  spoke, 
and  spreading  it  there  as  if  to  control  the  tumultu 
ous  fluttering  of  his  heart.  "Things  don't  end 
that  way  !  " 

A  sharp,  blinding  spasm  of  giddiness  closed 
upon  and  shook  him.  while  the  brave  words  were 
on  his  lips.  He  blinked  and  tottered  under  it,  as 
it  passed,  and  then  backed  humbly  to  his  divan 
and  sat  down,  gasping  a  little,  and  patting  his 
hand  on  his  heart.  There  was  fright  written  all 
over  his  whitened  face. 

«We —  we  forgot  that  I  am  a  sick  man,"  he 
said  feebly,  answering  Celia's  look  of  surprised 
inquiry  with  a  forced,  wan  smile.  "  I  was  afraid 
my  heart  had  gone  wrong." 

298 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

She  scrutinized  him  for  a  further  moment,  with 
growing  reassurance  in  her  air.  Then,  piling  up 
the  pillows  and  cushions  behind  him  for  support, 
for  all  the  world  like  a  big  sister  again,  she  stepped 
into  the  inner  room,  and  returned  with  a  flagon  of 
quaint  shape  and  a  tiny  glass.  She  poured  this 
latter  full  to  the  brim  of  a  thick  yellowish,  aromatic 
liquid,  and  gave  it  him  to  drink. 

"  This  Benedictine  is  all  I  happen  to  have,"  she 
said.  "  Swallow  it  down.  It  will  do  you  good." 

Theron  obeyed  her.  It  brought  tears  to  his 
eyes ;  but,  upon  reflection,  it  was  grateful  and 
warming.  He  did  feel  better  almost  immediately. 
A  great  wave  of  comfort  seemed  to  enfold  him  as 
he  settled  himself  back  on  the  divan.  For  that 
one  flashing  instant  he  had  thought  that  he  was 
dying.  He  drew  a  long  grateful  breath  of  relief, 
and  smiled  his  content. 

Celia  had  seated  herself  beside  him,  a  little  away. 
She  sat  with  her  head  against  the  wall,  and  one 
foot  curled  under  her,  and  almost  faced  him. 

"  I  dare  say  we  forced  the  pace  a  little,"  she 
remarked,  after  a  pause,  looking  down  at  the  floor, 
with  the  puckers  of  a  ruminating  amusement  play 
ing  in  the  corners  of  her  mouth.  "  It  does  n't  do 
for  a  man  to  get  to  be  a  Greek  all  of  a  sudden. 
He  must  work  along  up  to  it  gradually." 

He  remembered  the  music.  "  Oh,  if  I  only 
knew  how  to  tell  you,"  he  murmured  ecstatically, 
"  what  a  revelation  your  playing  has  been  to  me  ! 

299 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

1  had  never  imagined  anything  like  it.  I  shall 
think  of  it  to  my  dying  day." 

He  began  to  remember  as  well  the  spirit  that 
was  in  the  air  when  the  music  ended.  The  details 
of  what  he  had  felt  and  said  rose  vaguely  in  his 
mind.  Pondering  them,  his  eye  roved  past  Celia's 
white-robed  figure  to  the  broad,  open  doorway 
beyond.  The  curtains  behind  which  she  had 
disappeared  were  again  parted  and  fastened  back. 
A  dim  light  was  burning  within,  out  of  sight,  and 
its  faint  illumination  disclosed  a  room  filled  with 
white  marbles,  white  silks,  white  draperies  of  vary 
ing  sorts,  which  shaped  themselves,  as  he  looked, 
into  the  canopy  and  trappings  of  an  extravagantly 
over- sized  and  sumptuous  bed.  He  looked  away 
again. 

"  I  wish  you  would  tell  me  what  you  really 
mean  by  that  Greek  idea  of  yours,"  he  said  with 
the  abruptness  of  confusion. 

Celia  did  not  display  much  enthusiasm  in  the 
tone  of  her  answer.  "Oh,"  she  said  almost  indif 
ferently,  "  lots  of  things.  Absolute  freedom  from 
moral  bugbears,  for  one  thing.  The  recognition 
that  beauty  is  the  only  thing  in  life  that  is  worth 
while.  The  courage  to  kick  out  of  one's  life  every 
thing  that  is  n't  worth  while  ;  and  so  on." 

"  But,"  said  Theron,  watching  the  mingled 
delicacy  and  power  of  the  bared  arm  and  the 
shapely  grace  of  the  hand  which  she  had  lifted  to 
her  face,  "  I  am  going  to  get  you  to  teach  it  all  to 

300 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

me."  The  memories  began  crowding  in  upon  him 
now,  and  the  baffling  note  upon  which  the  mazurka 
had  stopped  short  chimed  like  a  tuning-fork  in  his 
ears.  "  I  want  to  be  a  Greek  myself,  if  you  're 
one.  I  want  to  get  as  close  to  you  —  to  your 
ideal,  that  is,  as  I  can.  You  open  up  to  me  a 
whole  world  that  I  had  not  even  dreamed  existed. 
We  swore  our  friendship  long  ago,  you  know : 
and  now,  after  to-night  —  you  and  the  music  have 
decided  me.  I  am  going  to  put  the  things  out  of 
my  life  that  are  not  worth  while.  Only  you  must 
help  me ;  you  must  tell  me  how  to  begin." 

He  looked  up  as  he  spoke,  to  enforce  the  almost 
tender  entreaty  of  his  words.  The  spectacle  of 
a  yawn,  only  fractionally  concealed  behind  those 
talented  fingers,  chilled  his  soft  speech,  and  sent  a 
flush  over  his  face.  He  rose  on  the  instant. 

Celia  was  nothing  abashed  at  his  discovery. 
She  laughed  gayly  in  confession  of  her  fault,  and 
held  her  hand  out  to  let  him  help  her  disentangle 
her  foot  from  her  draperies,  and  get  off  the  divan. 
It  seemed  to  be  her  meaning  that  he  should 
continue  holding  her  hand  after  she  was  also 
standing. 

"You  forgive  me,  don't  you?"  she  urged 
smilingly.  "  Chopin  always  first  excites  me,  then 
sends  me  to  sleep.  You  see  how  you  sleep 
to-night !  " 

The  brown,  velvety  eyes  rested  upon  him,  from 
under  their  heavy  lids,  with  a  languorous  kindli- 

301 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ness.  Her  warm,  large  palm  clasped  his  in  frank 
liking. 

"I  don't  want  to  sleep  at  all,"  Mr.  Ware  was 
impelled  to  say.  "  I  want  to  lie  awake  and  think 
about  —  about  everything  all  over  again." 

She  smiled  drowsily.  "  And  you  're  sure  you 
feel  strong  enough  to  walk  home?" 

"Yes,"  he  replied,  with  a  lingering  dilatory 
note,  which  deepened  upon  reflection  into  a  sigh. 
"  Oh,  yes." 

He  followed  her  and  her  candle  down  the 
magnificent  stairway  again.  She  blew  the  light 
out  in  the  hall,  and,  opening  the  front  door,  stood 
with  him  for  a  silent  moment  on  the  threshold. 
Then  they  shook  hands  once  more,  and  with  a 
whispered  good-night,  parted. 

Celia,  returning  to  the  blue  and  yellow  room, 
lighted  a  cigarette  and  helped  herself  to  some 
Benedictine  in  the  glass  which  Theron  had  used. 
She  looked  meditatively  at  this  little  glass  for  a 
moment,  turning  it  about  in  her  fingers  with  a 
smile.  The  smile  warmed  itself  suddenly  into 
a  joyous  laugh.  She  tossed  the  glass  aside,  and, 
holding  out  her  flowing  skirts  with  both  hands, 
executed  a  swinging  pirouette  in  front  of  the 
gravely  beautiful  statue  of  the  armless  woman. 


302 


CHAPTER   XX 

IT  was  apparent  to  the  Rev.  Theron  Ware,  from 
the  very  first  moment  of  waking  next  morning, 
that  both  he  and  the  world  had  changed  over  night. 
The  metamorphosis,  in  the  harsh  toils  of  which  he 
had  been  laboring  blindly  so  long,  was  accomplished. 
He  stood  forth,  so  to  speak,  in  a  new  skin,  and 
looked  about  him,  with  perceptions  of  quite  an 
altered  kind,  upon  what  seemed  in  every  way  a 
fresh  existence.  He  lacked  even  the  impulse  to 
turn  round  and  inspect  the  cocoon  from  which  he 
had  emerged.  Let  the  past  bury  the  past.  He 
had  no  vestige  of  interest  in  it. 

The  change  was  not  premature.  He  found 
himself  not  in  the  least  confused  by  it,  or 
frightened.  Before  he  had  finished  shaving,  he 
knew  himself  to  be  easily  and  comfortably  at 
home  in  his  new  state,  and  master  of  all  its 
requirements. 

It  seemed  as  if  Alice,  too,  recognized  that  he 
had  become  another  man,  when  he  went  down 
and  took  his  chair  at  the  breakfast  table.  They 
had  exchanged  no  words  since  their  parting  in 
the  depot-yard  the  previous  evening,  —  an  event 

303 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

now  faded  off  into  remote  vagueness  in  Theron's 
mind.  He  smiled  brilliantly  in  answer  to  the  fur 
tive,  half-sullen,  half-curious  glance  she  stole  at 
him,  as  she  brought  the  dishes  in. 

"Ah  !  potatoes  warmed  up  in  cream  !  "  he  said, 
with  hearty  pleasure  in  his  tone.  "  What  a  mind- 
reader  you  are,  to  be  sure  !  " 

"  I  'm  glad  you  're  feeling  so  much  better,"  she 
said  briefly,  taking  her  seat. 

"  Better?  "  he  returned.     "  I  'm  a  new  being !  " 

She  ventured  to  look  him  over  more  freely,  upon 
this  assurance.  He  perceived  and  catalogued,  one 
by  one,  the  emotions  which  the  small  brain  was  ex 
pressing  through  those  shallow  blue  eyes  of  hers. 
She  was  turning  over  this,  that,  and  the  other  hostile 
thought  and  childish  grievance,  —  most  of  all  she 
was  dallying  with  the  idea  of  asking  him  where  he 
had  been  till  after  midnight.  He  smiled  affably 
in  the  face  of  this  scattering  fire  of  peevish 
glances,  and  did  not  dream  of  resenting  any 
phase  of  them  all. 

"  I  am  going  down  to  Thurston's  this  morning, 
and  order  that  piano  sent  up  to-day,"  he  announced 
presently,  in  a  casual  way. 

"Why,  Theron,  can  we  afford  it?  "the  wife 
asked,  regarding  him  with  surprise. 

"  Oh,  easily  enough,"  he  replied  light-heartedly. 
"You  know  they've  increased  my  salary." 

She  shook  her  head.  "  No,  I  did  n't.  How 
should  I?  You  don't  realize  it,"  she  went  on, 

3°4 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

dolefully,  "  but  you  're    getting  so  you  don't   tell 
me  the  least  thing  about  your  affairs  nowadays." 

Theron  laughed  aloud.  "You  ought  to  be 
grateful,  —  such  melancholy  affairs  as  mine  have 
been  till  now,"  he  declared,  —  "  that  is,  if  it  were  n't 
absurd  to  think  such  a  thing."  Then,  more  soberly, 
he  explained :  "  No,  my  girl,  it  is  you  who  don't 
realize.  lam  carrying  big  projects  in  my  mind, — 
big,  ambitious  thoughts  and  plans  upon  which  great 
things  depend.  They  no  doubt  make  me  seem 
preoccupied  and  absent-minded ;  but  it  is  a  wife's 
part  to  understand,  and  make  allowances,  and  not 
intrude  trifles  which  may  throw  everything  out  of 
gear.  Don't  think  I  'm  scolding,  my  girl.  I  only 
speak  to  reassure  you  and  —  and  help  you  to  com 
prehend.  Of  course  I  know  that  you  wouldn't 
willingly  embarrass  my  —  my  career." 

"  Of  course  not,"  responded  Alice,  dubiously; 
"but  —  but — " 

"But  what?"  Theron  felt  compelled  by  civility 
to  say,  though  on  the  instant  he  reproached  him 
self  for  the  weakness  of  it. 

"Well —  I  hardly  know  how  to  say  it,"  she  fal 
tered,  "  but  it  was  nicer  in  the  old  days,  before  you 
bothered  your  head  about  big  projects,  and  your 
career,  as  you  call  it,  and  were  just  a  good,  earnest, 
simple  young  servant  of  the  Lord.  Oh,  Theron  !  " 
she  broke  forth  suddenly,  with  tearful  zeal,  "  I 
get  sometimes  lately  almost  scared  lest  you  should 
turn  out  to  be  a  —  a  backslider!" 
20  3°5 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

The  husband  sat  upright,  and  hardened  his 
countenance.  But  yesterday  the  word  would  have 
had  in  it  all  sorts  of  inherited  terrors  for  him. 
This  morning's  dawn  of  a  new  existence  revealed 
it  as  merely  an  empty  and  stupid  epithet. 

"These  are  things  not  to  be  said,"  he  admon 
ished  her,  after  a  moment's  pause,  and  speaking 
with  carefully  measured  austerity.  "  Least  of  all 
are  they  to  be  said  to  a  clergyman  —  by  his 
wife." 

It  was  on  the  tip  of  Alice's  tongue  to  retort, 
"  Better  by  his  wife  than  by  outsiders ! "  but 
she  bit  her  lips,  and  kept  the  gibe  back.  A 
rebuke  of  this  form  and  gravity  was  a  novelty  in 
their  relations.  The  fear  that  it  had  been  merited 
troubled,  even  while  it  did  not  convince,  her  mind, 
and  the  puzzled  apprehension  was  to  be  read  plainly 
enough  on  her  face. 

Theron,  noting  it,  saw  a  good  deal  more  behind. 
Really,  it  was  amazing  how  much  wiser  he  had 
grown  all  at  once.  He  had  been  married  for  years, 
and  it  was  only  this  morning  that  he  suddenly  dis 
covered  how  a  wife  ought  to  be  handled.  He  con 
tinued  to  look  sternly  away  into  space  for  a  little. 
Then  his  brows  relaxed  slowly  and  under  the  visi 
ble  influence  of  melting  considerations.  He  nodded 
his  head,  turned  toward  her  abruptly,  and  broke 
the  silence  with  labored  amiability. 

"  Come,  come  —  the  day  began  so  pleasantly  — • 
it  was  so  good  to  feel  well  again  —  let  us  talk  about 

306 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  piano  instead.  That  is,"  he  added,  with  an 
obvious  overture  to  playfulness,  "  if  the  thought 
of  having  a  piano  is  not  too  distasteful  to  you." 

Alice  yielded  almost  effusively  to  his  altered 
mood.  They  went  together  into  the  sitting-room, 
to  measure  and  decide  between  the  two  available 
spaces  which  were  at  their  disposal,  and  he  insisted 
with  resolute  magnanimity  on  her  settling  this  ques 
tion  entirely  by  herself.  When  at  last  he  mentioned 
the  fact  that  it  was  Friday,  and  he  would  look  over 
some  sermon  memoranda  before  he  went  out,  Alice 
retired  to  the  kitchen  in  openly  cheerful  spirits. 

Theron  spread  some  old  manuscript  sermons 
before  him  on  his  desk,  and  took  down  his  scrib- 
bling-book  as  well.  But  there  his  application 
flagged,  and  he  surrendered  himself  instead,  chin 
on  hand,  to  staring  out  at  the  rhododendron  in 
the  yard.  He  recalled  how  he  had  seen  Soulsby 
patiently  studying  this  identical  bush.  The  notion 
of  Soulsby,  not  knowing  at  all  how  to  sing,  yet  dili 
gently  learning  those  sixths,  brought  a  smile  to  his 
mind ;  and  then  he  seemed  to  hear  Celia  calling 
out  over  her  shoulder,  "  That 's  what  Chopin  does, 
—  he  sings  !  "  The  spirit  of  that  wonderful  music 
came  back  to  him,  enfolded  him  in  its  wings.  It 
seemed  to  raise  itself  up,  —  a  palpable  barrier  be 
tween  him  and  all  that  he  had  known  and  felt 
and  done  before.  That  was  his  new  birth,  —  that 
marvellous  night  with  the  piano.  The  conceit 
pleased  him,  —  not  the  less  because  there  flashed 

3°7 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

along  with  it  the  thought  that  it  was  a  poet  that 
had  been  born.  Yes ;  the  former  country  lout, 
the  narrow  zealot,  the  untutored  slave  groping 
about  in  the  dark  after  silly  superstitions,  cring 
ing  at  the  scowl  of  mean  Pierces  and  Winches, 
was  dead.  There  was  an  end  of  him,  and  good 
riddance.  In  his  place  there  had  been  born  a 
Poet,  —  he  spelled  the  word  out  now  unabashed, 
—  a  child  of  light,  a  lover  of  beauty  and  sweet 
sounds,  a  recognizable  brother  to  Renan  and 
Chopin  —  and  Celia  ! 

Out  of  the  soothing,  tenderly  grateful  revery,  a 
practical  suggestion  suddenly  took  shape.  He 
acted  upon  it  without  a  moment's  delay,  getting 
out  his  letter-pad,  and  writing  hurriedly,  — 

"  DEAR  Miss  MADDEN,  —  Life  will  be  more  toler 
able  to  me  if  before  nightfall  I  can  know  that 
there  is  a  piano  under  my  roof.  Even  if  it 
remains  dumb,  it  will  be  some  comfort  to  have 
it  here  and  look  at  it,  and  imagine  how  a  great 
master  might  make  it  speak. 

"  Would  it  be  too  much  to  beg  you  to  look  in 
at  Thurston's,  say  at  eleven  this  forenoon,  and  give 
me  the  inestimable  benefit  of  your  judgment  in 
selecting  an  instrument? 

"  Do  not  trouble  to  answer  this,  for  I  am  leav 
ing  home  now,  but  shall  call  at  Thurston's  at 
eleven,  and  wait. 

"  Thanking  you  in  anticipation, 

"  I  am  —  " 

308 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Here  Theron's  fluency  came  to  a  sharp  halt. 
There  were  adverbs  enough  and  to  spare  on  the 
point  of  his  pen,  but  the  right  one  was  not  easy  to 
come  at.  "  Gratefully,"  "  faithfully,"  "  sincerely," 
"  truly,"  —  each  in  turn  struck  a  false  note.  He 
felt  himself  not  quite  any  of  these  things.  At  last 
he  decided  to  write  just  the  simple  word  "  yours," 
and  then  wavered  between  satisfaction  at  his 
boldness,  dread  lest  he  had  been  over-bold,  and, 
worst  of  the  lot,  fear  that  she  would  not  notice  it 
one  way  or  the  other,  —  all  the  while  he  sealed 
and  addressed  the  letter,  put  it  carefully  in  an 
inner  pocket,  and  got  his  hat. 

There  was  a  moment's  hesitation  as  to  notifying 
the  kitchen  of  his  departure.  The  interests  of 
domestic  discipline  seemed  to  point  the  other 
way.  He  walked  softly  through  the  hall,  and  let 
himself  out  by  the  front  door  without  a  sound. 

Down  by  the  canal  bridge  he  picked  out  an  idle 
boy  to  his  mind,  —  a  lad  whose  aspect  appeared  to 
promise  intelligence  as  a  messenger,  combined  with 
large  impartiality  in  sectarian  matters.  He  was  to 
have  ten  cents  on  his  return ;  and  he  might  report 
himself  to  his  patron  at  the  bookstore  yonder. 

Theron  was  grateful  to  the  old  bookseller  for 
remaining  at  his  desk  in  the  rear.  There  was  a 
tacit  compliment  in  the  suggestion  that  he  was  not 
a  mere  customer,  demanding  instant  attention. 
Besides,  there  was  no  keeping  "  Thurston's  "  out 
of  conversations  in  this  place. 

309 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Loitering  along  the  shelves,  the  young  minister's 
eye  suddenly  found  itself  arrested  by  a  name  on  a 
cover.  There  were  a  dozen  narrow  volumes  in 
uniform  binding,  huddled  together  under  a  card 
board  label  of  "  Eminent  Women  Series."  Oddly 
enough,  one  of  these  bore  the  title  "  George 
Sand."  Theron  saw  there  must  be  some  mistake, 
as  he  took  the  book  down,  and  opened  it.  His 
glance  hit  by  accident  upon  the  name  of  Chopin. 
Then  he  read  attentively  until  almost  the  stroke 
of  eleven. 

"  We  have  to  make  ourselves  acquainted  with 
all  sorts  of  queer  phases  of  life,"  he  explained  in 
self-defence  to  the  old  bookseller,  then  counting 
out  the  money  for  the  book  from  his  lean  purse. 
He  smiled  as  he  added,  "  There  seems  something 
almost  wrong  about  taking  advantage  of  the  clergy 
man's  discount  for  a  life  of  George  Sand." 

"  I  don't  know,"  answered  the  other,  pleasantly. 
"  Guess  she  was  n't  so  much  different  from  the 
rest  of  'em,  —  except  that  she  did  n't  mind  ap 
pearances.  We  know  about  her.  We  don't  know 
about  the  others." 

"  I  must  hurry,"  said  Theron,  turning  on  his 
heel.  The  haste  with  which  he  strode  out  of  the 
store,  crossed  the  street,  and  made  his  way  toward 
Thurston's,  did  not  prevent  his  thinking  much  upon 
the  astonishing  things  he  had  encountered  in  this 
book.  Their  relation  to  Celia  forced  itself  more  and 
more  upon  his  mind.  He  could  recall  the  twinkle 

310 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

in  her  eye,  the  sub-mockery  in  her  tone,  as  she 
commented  with  that  half-contemptuous  "  Yes  — 
George  something  ! "  upon  his  blundering  igno 
rance.  His  mortification  at  having  thus  exposed 
his  dull  rusticity  was  swallowed  up  in  conjectures 
as  to  just  what  her  tolerant  familiarity  with  such 
things  involved.  He  had  never  before  met  a 
young  unmarried  woman  who  would  have  con 
fessed  to  him  any  such  knowledge.  But  then,  of 
course,  he  had  never  known  a  girl  who  resembled 
Celia  in  any  other  way.  He  recognized  vaguely 
that  he  must  provide  himself  with  an  entire  new 
set  of  standards  by  which  to  measure  and  com 
prehend  her.  But  it  was  for  the  moment  more 
interesting  to  wonder  what  her  standards  were. 
Did  she  object  to  George  Sand's  behavior?  Or 
did  she  sympathize  with  that  sort  of  thing?  Did 
those  statues,  and  the  loose- flowing  diaphanous 
toga  and  unbound  hair,  the  cigarettes,  the  fiery 
liqueur,  the  deliberately  sensuous  music,  —  was  he 
to  believe  that  they  signified  —  ? 

"  Good- morning,  Mr.  Ware.  You  have  managed 
by  a  miracle  to  hit  on  one  of  my  punctual  days," 
said  Celia. 

She  was  standing  on  the  doorstep,  at  the 
entrance  to  the  musical  department  of  Thurston's. 
He  had  not  noticed  before  the  fact  that  the  sun 
was  shining.  The  full  glare  of  its  strong  light, 
enveloping  her  figure  as  she  stood,  and  drawing 
the  dazzled  eye  for  relief  to  the  bower  of  softened 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

color,  close  beneath  her  parasol  of  creamy  silk  and 
lace,  was  what  struck  him  now  first  of  all.  It  was 
as  if  Celia  had  brought  the  sun  with  her. 

Theron  shook  hands  with  her,  and  found  joy  in 
the  perception  that  his  own  hand  trembled.  He 
put  boldly  into  words  the  thought  that  came  to  him. 

"  It  was  generous  of  you,"  he  said,  "  to  wait 
for  me  out  here,  where  all  might  delight  in  the 
sight  of  you,  instead  of  squandering  the  privi 
lege  on  a  handful  of  clerks  inside." 

Miss  Madden  beamed  upon  him,  and  nodded 
approval. 

"  Alcibiades  never  turned  a  prettier  compli 
ment,"  she  remarked.  They  went  in  together  at 
this,  and  Theron  made  a  note  of  the  name. 

During  the  ensuing  half- hour,  the  young  min 
ister  followed  about  even  more  humbly  than  the 
clerks  in  Celia's  commanding  wake.  There  were 
a  good  many  pianos  in  the  big  show-room  over 
head,  and  Theron  found  himself  almost  awed  by 
their  size  and  brilliancy  of  polish,  and  the  thought 
of  the  tremendous  sum  of  money  they  represented 
altogether.  Not  so  with  the  organist.  She  ordered 
them  rolled  around  this  way  or  that,  as  if  they  had 
been  so  many  checkers  on  a  draught-board.  She 
threw  back  their  covers  with  the  scant  ceremony 
of  a  dispensary  dentist  opening  paupers'  mouths. 
She  exploited  their  several  capacities  with  master 
ful  hands,  not  deigning  to  seat  herself,  but  just 
slightly  bending  forward,  and  sweeping  her  fingers 

312 


THE  DAMNATION   OF  TH-ERON  WARE 

up  and  down  their  keyboards,  —  able,  domineer 
ing  fingers  which  pounded,  tinkled,  meditated, 
assented,  condemned,  all  in  a  flash,  and  amid 
what  affected  the  layman's  ears  as  a  hopelessly 
discordant  hubbub. 

Theron  moved  about  in  the  group,  nursing  her 
parasol  in  his  arms,  and  watching  her.  The  exag 
gerated  deference  which  the  clerks  and  salesmen 
showed  to  her  as  the  rich  Miss  Madden,  seemed  to 
him  to  be  mixed  with  a  certain  assertion  of  the 
claims  of  good-fellowship  on  the  score  of  her  being 
a  musician.  There  undoubtedly  was  a  sense  of 
freemasonry  between  them.  They  alluded  con 
tinually  in  technical  terms  to  matters  of  which  he 
knew  nothing,  and  were  amused  at  remarks  of  hers 
which  to  him  carried  no  meaning  whatever.  It 
was  evident  that  the  young  men  liked  her,  and 
that  their  liking  pleased  her.  It  thrilled  him  to 
think  that  she  knew  he  liked  her,  too,  and  to 
recall  what  abundant  proofs  she  had  given  that 
here,  also,  she  had  pleasure  in  the  fact.  He  clung 
insistently  to  the  memory  of  these  evidences. 
They  helped  him  to  resist  a  disagreeable  tendency 
to  feel  himself  an  intruder,  an  outsider,  among 
these  pianoforte  experts. 

When  it  was  all  over,  Celia  waved  the  others 
aside,  and  talked  with  Theron.  "  I  suppose  you 
want  me  to  tell  you  the  truth,"  she  said.  "  There  's 
nothing  here  really  good.  It  is  always  much 
better  to  buy  of  the  makers  direct." 

3*3 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"Do  they  sell  on  the  instalment  plan?"  he 
asked.  There  was  a  wistful  effect  in  his  voice 
which  caught  her  attention. 

She  looked  away  —  out  through  the  window  on 
the  street  below  —  for  a  moment.  Then  her  eyes 
returned  to  his,  and  regarded  him  with  a  comfort 
ing,  friendly,  half- motherly  glance,  recalling  for 
all  the  world  the  way  Sister  Soulsby  had  looked  at 
him  at  odd  times. 

"  Oh,  you  want  it  at  once  —  I  see,"  she  re 
marked  softly.  "Well,  this  Adelberger  is  the 
best  value  for  the  money." 

Mr.  Ware  followed  her  finger,  and  beheld  with 
dismay  that  it  pointed  toward  the  largest  instru 
ment  in  the  room,  —  a  veritable  leviathan  among 
pianos.  The  price  of  this  had  been  mentioned  as 
$600.  He  turned  over  the  fact  that  this  was  two- 
thirds  his  yearly  salary,  and  found  the  courage  to 
shake  his  head. 

"  It  would  be  too  large  —  much  too  large  —  for 
the  room,"  he  explained.  "And,  besides,  it  is 
mere  than  I  like  to  pay  —  or  can  pay,  for  that 
matter."  It  was  pitiful  to  be  explaining  such 
details,  but  there  was  no  help  for  it. 

They  picked  out  a  smaller  one,  which  Celia  said 
was  at  least  of  fair  quality.  "  Now  leave  all  the 
bargaining  to  me,"  she  adjured  him.  "These 
prices  that  they  talk  about  in  the  piano  trade  are 
all  in  the  air.  There  are  tremendous  discounts,  if 
one  knows  how  to  insist  upon  them.  All  you  have 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

to  do  is  to  tell  them  to  send  it  to  your  house  — • 
you  wanted  it  to-day,  you  said  ?  " 

"Yes  —  in  memory  of  yesterday,"  he  mur 
mured. 

She  herself  gave  the  directions,  and  Thurston's 
people,  now  all  salesmen  again,  bowed  grateful 
acquiescence.  Then  she  sailed  regally  across  the 
room  and  down  the  stairs,  drawing  Theron  in  her 
train.  The  hirelings  made  salaams  to  him  as 
well ;  it  would  have  been  impossible  to  interpose 
anything  so  trivial  and  squalid  as  talk  about  terms 
and  dates  of  payment. 

"  I  am  ever  so  much  obliged  to  you,"  he  said 
fervently,  in  the  comparative  solitude  of  the  lower 
floor.  She  had  paused  to  look  at  something  in  the 
book-department. 

"  Of  course  I  was  entirely  at  your  service  ;  don't 
mention  it,"  she  replied,  reaching  forth  her  hand 
in  an  absent  way  for  her  parasol. 

He  held  up  instead  the  volume  he  had  pur 
chased.  "  Guess  what  that  is  !  You  never  would 
guess  in  this  wide  world  !  "  His  manner  was  sur 
charged  with  a  sense  of  the  surreptitious. 

"  Well,  then,  there  's  no  good  trying,  is  there  ?  " 
commented  Celia,  her  glance  roving  again  toward 
the  shelves. 

"  It  is  a  life  of  George  Sand,"  whispered  Theron. 
"  I  Ve  been  reading  it  this  morning  —  all  the 
Chopin  part  —  while  I  was  waiting  for  you." 

To  his  surprise,  there  was  an  apparently  dis- 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

pleased  contraction  of  her  brows  as  he  made  this 
revelation.  For  the  instant,  a  dreadful  fear  of 
having  offended  her  seized  upon  and  sickened  him. 
But  then  her  face  cleared,  as  by  magic.  She 
smiled,  and  let  her  eyes  twinkle  in  laughter  at  him, 
and  lifted  a  forefinger  in  the  most  winning  mock 
ery  of  admonition. 

"  Naughty  !  naughty  !  "  she  murmured  back, 
with  a  roguishly  solemn  wink. 

He  had  no  response  ready  for  this,  but  mutely 
handed  her  the  parasol.  The  situation  had  sud 
denly  grown  too  confused  for  words,  or  even  se 
quent  thoughts.  Uppermost  across  the  hurly-burly 
of  his  mind  there  scudded  the  singular  reflection 
that  he  should  never  hear  her  play  on  that  new 
piano  of  his.  Even  as  it  flashed  by  out  of  sight, 
he  recognized  it  for  one  of  the  griefs  of  his  life ; 
and  the  darkness  which  followed  seemed  nothing 
but  a  revolt  against  the  idea  of  having  a  piano  at 
all.  He  would  countermand  the  order.  He  would 
—  but  she  was  speaking  again. 

They  had  strolled  toward  the  door,  and  her 
voice  was  as  placidly  conventional  as  if  the  talk 
had  never  strayed  from  the  subject  of  pianos. 
Theron  with  an  effort  pulled  himself  together,  and 
laid  hold  of  her  words. 

"  I  suppose  you  will  be  going  the  other  way," 
she  was  saying.  "  I  shall  have  to  be  at  the  church 
all  day.  We  have  just  got  a  new  Mass  over  from 
Vienna,  and  I  'm  head  over  heels  in  work  at  it.  I 

316 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

can  have  Father  Forbes  to  myself  to-day,  too. 
That  bear  of  a  doctor  has  got  the  rheumatism,  and 
can't  come  out  of  his  cave,  thank  Heaven  !  " 

And  then  she  was  receding  from  view,  up  the 
sunlit,  busy  sidewalk,  and  Theron,  standing  on  the 
doorstep,  ruefully  rubbed  his  chin.  She  had  said 
he  was  going  the  other  way,  and,  after  a  little  pause, 
he  made  her  words  good,  though  each  step  he  took 
seemed  all  in  despite  of  his  personal  inclinations. 
Some  of  the  passers-by  bowed  to  him,  and  one  or 
two  paused  as  if  to  shake  hands  and  exchange 
greetings.  He  nodded  responses  mechanically, 
but  did  not  stop.  It  was  as  if  he  feared  to  inter 
rupt  the  process  of  lifting  his  reluctant  feet  and 
propelling  them  forward,  lest  they  should  wheel 
and  scuttle  off  in  the  opposite  direction. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

DELIBERATE  as  his  progress  was,  the  diminishing 
number  of  store-fronts  along  the  sidewalk,  and  the 
increasing  proportion  of  picket-fences  enclosing 
domestic  lawns,  forced  upon  Theron's  attention 
the  fact  that  he  was  nearing  home.  It  was  a  trifle 
past  the  hour  for  his  midday  meal.  He  was  not 
in  the  least  hungry ;  still  less  did  he  feel  any 
desire  just  now  to  sit  about  in  that  library  living- 
room  of  his.  Why  should  he  go  home  at  all? 
There  was  no  reason  whatever  —  save  that  Alice 
would  be  expecting  him.  Upon  reflection,  that 
hardly  amounted  to  a  reason.  Wives,  with  their 
limited  grasp  of  the  realities  of  life,  were  always 
expecting  their  husbands  to  do  things  which  it 
turned  out  not  to  be  feasible  for  them  to  do.  The 
customary  male  animal  spent  a  considerable  part 
of  his  life  in  explaining  to  his  mate  why  it  had 
been  necessary  to  disappoint  or  upset  her  little 
plans  for  his  comings  and  goings.  It  was  in  the 
very  nature  of  things  that  it  should  be  so. 

Sustained  by  these  considerations,  Mr.  Ware 
slackened  his  steps,  then  halted  irresolutely,  and 
after  a  minute's  hesitation,  entered  the  small  tern- 

31* 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

perance  restaurant  before  which,  as  by  intuition, 
he  had  paused.  The  elderly  woman  who  placed 
on  the  tiny  table  before  him  the  tea  and  rolls  he 
ordered,  was  entirely  unknown  to  him,  he  felt  sure, 
yet  none  the  less  she  smiled  at  him,  and  spoke 
almost  familiarly,  — 

"  I  suppose  Mrs.  Ware  is  at  the  seaside,  and 
you  are  keeping  bachelor's  hall?" 

"  Not  quite  that,"  he  responded  stiffly,  and  hur 
ried  through  the  meagre  and  distasteful  repast,  to 
avoid  any  further  conversation. 

There  was  an  idea  underlying  her  remark,  how 
ever,  which  recurred  to  him  when  he  had  paid  his 
ten  cents  and  got  out  on  the  street  again.  There 
was  something  interesting  in  the  thought  of  Alice 
at  the  seaside.  Neither  of  them  had  ever  laid  eyes 
on  salt  water,  but  Theron  took  for  granted  the 
most  extravagant  landsman's  conception  of  its  cur 
ative  and  invigorating  powers.  It  was  apparent  to 
him  that  he  was  going  to  pay  much  greater  atten 
tion  to  Alice's  happiness  and  well-being  in  the 
future  than  he  had  latterly  done.  He  had  bought 
her,  this  very  day,  a  superb  new  piano.  He  was 
going  to  simply  insist  on  her  having  a  hired  girl. 
And  this  seaside  notion,  —  why,  that  was  best  of 
all. 

His  fancy  built  up  pleasant  visions  of  her  feast 
ing  her  delighted  eyes  upon  the  marvel  of  a  great 
ocean  storm,  or  roaming  along  a  beach  strewn  with 
wonderful  marine  shells,  exhibiting  an  innocent  joy 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

in  their  beauty.  The  fresh  sea-breeze  blew  through 
her  hair,  as  he  saw  her  in  mind's  eye,  and  brought 
the  hardy  flush  of  health  back  upon  her  rather 
pallid  cheeks.  He  was  prepared  already  hardly  to 
know  her,  so  robust  and  revivified  would  she  have 
become,  by  the  time  he  went  down  to  the  depot 
to  meet  her  on  her  return. 

For  his  imagination  stopped  short  of  seeing 
himself  at  the  seaside.  It  sketched  instead  pic 
tures  of  whole  weeks  of  solitary  academic  calm, 
alone  with  his  books  and  his  thoughts.  The  facts 
that  he  had  no  books,  and  that  nobody  dreamed  of 
interfering  with  his  thoughts,  subordinated  them 
selves  humbly  to  his  mood.  The  prospect,  as  he 
mused  fondly  upon  it,  expanded  to  embrace  the 
priest's  and  the  doctor's  libraries ;  the  thoughts 
which  he  longed  to  be  alone  with  involved  close 
communion  with  their  thoughts.  It  could  not  but 
prove  a  season  of  immense  mental  stimulation  and 
ethical  broadening.  It  would  have  its  lofty  poetic 
and  artistic  side  as  well ;  the  languorous  melodies 
of  Chopin  stole  over  his  revery,  as  he  dwelt  upon 
these  things,  and  soft  azure  and  golden  lights 
modelled  forth  the  exquisite  outlines  of  tall  marble 
forms. 

He  opened  the  gate  leading  to  Dr.  Ledsmar's 
house.  His  walk  had  brought  him  quite  out  of 
the  town,  and  up,  by  a  broad  main  highway  which 
yet  took  on  all  sorts  of  sylvan  charms,  to  a  com 
manding  site  on  the  hillside.  Below,  in  the  valley, 

320 


lay  Octavius,  at  one  end  half-hidden  in  factory 
smoke,  at  the  other,  where  narrow  bands  of  water 
gleamed  upon  the  surface  of  a  broad  plain  piled 
symmetrically  with  lumber,  presenting  an  oddly 
incongruous  suggestion  of  forest  odors  and  the 
simplicity  of  the  wilderness.  In  the  middle  dis 
tance,  on  gradually  rising  ground,  stretched  a  wide 
belt  of  dense,  artificial  foliage,  peeping  through 
which  tiled  turrets  and  ornamented  chimneys 
marked  the  polite  residences  of  those  who,  though 
they  neither  stoked  the  furnace  fires  to  the  west, 
nor  sawed  the  lumber  on  the  east,  lived  in  purple 
and  fine  linen  from  the  profits  of  this  toil.  Nearer 
at  hand,  pastures  with  grazing  cows  on  the  one 
side  of  the  road,  and  the  high,  weather-stained 
board  fence  of  the  race-course  on  the  other,  com 
pleted  the  jumble  of  primitive  rusticity  and  urban 
complications  characterizing  the  whole  picture. 

Dr.  Ledsmar's  house,  toward  which  Theron's 
impulses  had  been  secretly  leading  him  ever  since 
Celia's  parting  remark  about  the  rheumatism, 
was  of  that  spacious  and  satisfying  order  of  old- 
fashioned  houses  which  men  of  leisure  and  means 
built  for  themselves  while  the  early  traditions  of 
a  sparse  and  contented  homogeneous  population 
were  still  strong  in  the  Republic.  There  was  a  hos 
pitable  look  about  its  wide  veranda,  its  broad,  low 
bulk,  and  its  big,  double  front  door,  which  did  not 
fit  at  all  with  the  sketch  of  a  man-hating  recluse 
that  the  doctor  had  drawn  of  himself. 

21  321 


Theron  had  prepared  his  mind  for  the  effect  of 
being  admitted  by  a  Chinaman,  and  was  taken 
somewhat  aback  when  the  door  was  opened  by 
the  doctor  himself.  His  reception  was  pleasant 
enough,  almost  cordial,  but  the  sense  of  awkward 
ness  followed  him  into  his  host's  inner  room  and 
rested  heavily  upon  his  opening  speech. 

"  I  heard,  quite  by  accident,  that  you  were  ill," 
he  said,  laying  aside  his  hat. 

"  It 's  nothing  at  all,"  replied  Ledsmar.  "  Merely 
a  stiff  shoulder  that  I  wear  from  time  to  time  in 
memory  of  my  father.  It  ought  to  be  quite  gone 
by  nightfall.  It  was  good  of  you  to  come,  all  the 
same.  Sit  down  if  you  can  find  a  chair.  As  usual, 
we  are  littered  up  to  our  eyes  here.  That 's  it, — 
throw  those  things  on  the  floor." 

Mr.  Ware  carefully  deposited  an  armful  of 
pamphlets  on  the  rug  at  his  feet,  and  sat  down. 
Litter  was  indeed  the  word  for  what  he  saw  about 
him.  Bookcases,  chairs,  tables,  the  corners  of 
the  floor,  were  all  buried  deep  under  disorderly 
strata  of  papers,  diagrams,  and  opened  books. 
One  could  hardly  walk  about  without  treading  on 
them.  The  dust  which  danced  up  into  the  bar 
of  sunshine  streaming  in  from  the  window,  as  the 
doctor  stepped  across  to  another  chair,  gave  Theron 
new  ideas  about  the  value  of  Chinese  servants. 

"I  must  thank  you,  first  of  all,  doctor,"  he 
began,  "  for  your  kindness  in  coming  when  1  was 
ill.  •'  I  was  sick,  and  ye  visited  me.' ' 

322 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  You  must  n't  think  of  it  that  way,"  said  Leds- 
mar ;  "  your  friend  came  for  me,  and  of  course  I 
went ;  and  gladly  too.  There  was  nothing  that 
I  could  do,  or  that  anybody  could  do.  Very 
interesting  man,  that  friend  of  yours.  And  his 
wife,  too,  —  both  quite  out  of  the  common.  I 
don't  know  when  I  Ve  seen  two  such  really  genu 
ine  people.  I  should  like  to  have  known  more  of 
them.  Are  they  still  here?  " 

"They  went  yesterday,"  Theron  replied.  His 
earlier  shyness  had  worn  off,  and  he  felt  comfort 
ably  at  his  ease.  "  I  don't  know,"  he  went  on, 
"  that  the  word  e  genuine  '  is  just  what  would  have 
occurred  to  me  to  describe  the  Soulsbys.  They 
are  very  interesting  people,  as  you  say,  —  most  in 
teresting,  —  and  there  was  a  time,  I  dare  say,  when 
I  should  have  believed  in  their  sincerity.  But  of 
course  I  saw  them  and  their  performance  from  the 
inside,  —  like  one  on  the  stage  of  a  theatre,  you 
know,  instead  of  in  the  audience,  and  —  well,  I 
understand  things  better  than  I  used  to." 

The  doctor  looked  over  his  spectacles  at  him 
with  a  suggestion  of  inquiry  in  his  glance,  and 
Theron  continued  :  "  I  had  several  long  talks  with 
her ;  she  told  me  very  frankly  the  whole  story  of 
her  life  —  and  —  and  it  was  decidedly  queer,  I  can 
assure  you  !  I  may  say  to  you  —  you  will  under 
stand  what  I  mean  —  that  since  my  talk  with  you, 
and  the  books  you  lent  me,  I  see  many  things  dif 
ferently.  Indeed,  when  I  think  upon  it  sometimes 

323 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

my  old  state  of  mind  seems  quite  incredible  to 
me.  I  can  use  no  word  for  my  new  state  short  of 
illumination." 

Dr.  Ledsmar  continued  to  regard  his  guest  with 
that  calm,  interrogatory  scrutiny  of  his.  He  did 
not  seem  disposed  to  take  up  the  great  issue  of 
illumination.  "I  suppose,"  he  said  after  a  little, 
"  no  woman  can  come  in  contact  with  a  priest  for 
any  length  of  time  without  telling  him  the  '  story 
of  her  life,'  as  you  call  it.  They  all  do  it.  The 
thing  amounts  to  a  law." 

The  young  minister's  veins  responded  with  a 
pleasurable  thrill  to  the  use  of  the  word  "  priest " 
in  obvious  allusion  to  himself.  "  Perhaps  in  fair 
ness  I  ought  to  explain,"  he  said,  "  that  in  her 
case  it  was  only  done  in  the  course  of  a  long  talk 
about  myself.  I  might  say  that  it  was  by  way  of 
kindly  warning  to  me.  She  saw  how  I  had  be 
come  unsettled  in  many  —  many  of  my  former 
views — and  she  was  nervous  lest  this  should  lead 
me  to  —  to  —  " 

"To  throw  up  the  priesthood,"  the  doctor  in 
terposed  upon  his  hesitation.  "  Yes,  I  know  the 
tribe.  Why,  my  dear  sir,  your  entire  profession 
would  have  perished  from  the  memory  of  man 
kind,  if  it  had  n't  been  for  women.  It  is  a  very 
curious  subject.  Lots  of  thinkers  have  dipped 
into  it,  but  no  one  has  gone  resolutely  in  with  a 
search-light  and  exploited  the  whole  thing.  Our 
boys,  for  instance,  traverse  in  their  younger  years 

324 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

all  the  stages  of  the  childhood  of  the  race.  They 
have  terrifying  dreams  of  awful  monsters  and  giant 
animals  of  which  they  have  never  so  much  as  heard 
in  their  waking  hours ;  they  pass  through  the  lust 
for  digging  caves,  building  fires,  sleeping  out  in 
the  woods,  hunting  with  bows  and  arrows,  —  all 
remote  ancestral  impulses ;  they  play  games  with 
stones,  marbles,  and  so  on  at  regular  stated  periods 
of  the  year  which  they  instinctively  know,  just  as 
they  were  played  in  the  Bronze  Age,  and  heaven 
only  knows  how  much  earlier.  But  the  boy  goes 
through  all  this,  and  leaves  it  behind  him,  —  so 
completely  that  the  grown  man  feels  himself  more 
a  stranger  among  boys  of  his  own  place  who  are 
thinking  and  doing  precisely  the  things  he  thought 
and  did  a  few  years  before,  than  he  would  among 
Kurds  or  Esquimaux.  But  the  woman  is  totally 
different.  She  is  infinitely  more  precocious  as  a 
girl.  At  an  age  when  her  slow  brother  is  still 
stubbing  along  somewhere  in  the  neolithic  period, 
she  has  flown  way  ahead  to  a  kind  of  mediaeval 
stage,  or  dawn  of  mediaevalism,  which  is  peculiarly 
her  own.  Having  got  there,  she  stays  there;  she 
dies  there.  The  boy  passes  her,  as  the  tortoise 
did  the  hare.  He  goes  on,  if  he  is  a  philosopher, 
and  lets  her  remain  in  the  dark  ages,  where  she 
belongs.  If  he  happens  to  be  a  fool,  which  is 
customary,  he  stops  and  hangs  around  in  her 
vicinity." 

Theron   smiled.     "  We   priests,"   he    said,   and 

325 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

paused  again  to  enjoy  the  words,  —  "I  suppose  I 
oughtn't  to  inquire  too  closely  just  where  we 
belong  in  the  procession." 

"  We  are  considering  the  question  imperson 
ally,"  said  the  doctor.  "  First  of  all,  what  you 
regard  as  religion  is  especially  calculated  to  attract 
women.  They  remain  as  superstitious  to-day, 
down  in  the  marrow  of  their  bones,  as  they  were 
ten  thousand  years  ago.  Even  the  cleverest  of 
them  are  secretly  afraid  of  omens,  and  respect 
auguries.  Think  of  the  broadest  women  you 
know.  One  of  them  will  throw  salt  over  her 
shoulder  if  she  spills  it.  Another  drinks  money 
from  her  cup  by  skimming  the  bubbles  in  a  spoon. 
Another  forecasts  her  future  by  the  arrangement 
of  tea-grounds.  They  make  the  constituency  to 
which  an  institution  based  on  mysteries,  miracles, 
and  the  supernatural  generally,  would  naturally 
appeal.  Secondly,  there  is  the  personality  of  the 
priest." 

"  Yes,"  assented  Ware.  There  rose  up  before 
him,  on  the  instant,  the  graceful,  portly  figure  and 
strong,  comely  face  of  Father  Forbes. 

"  Women  are  not  a  metaphysical  people.  They 
do  not  easily  follow  abstractions.  They  want  their 
dogmas  and  religious  sentiments  embodied  in  a 
man,  just  as  they  do  their  romantic  fancies.  Of 
course  you  Protestants,  with  your  married  clergy, 
see  less  of  the  effects  of  this  than  celibates  do,  but 
even  with  you  there  is  a  great  deal  in  it.  Why,  the 

326 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

very  institution  of  celibacy  itself  was  forced  upon 
the  early  Christian  Church  by  the  scandal  of  rich 
Roman  ladies  loading  bishops  and  handsome 
priests  with  fabulous  gifts,  until  the  passion  for 
currying  favor  with  women  of  wealth,  and  marry 
ing  them  or  wheedling  their  fortunes  from  them, 
debauched  the  whole  priesthood.  You  should 
read  your  Jerome." 

"  I  will,  —  certainly,"  said  the  listener,  resolving 
to  remember  the  name  and  refer  it  to  the  old 
bookseller. 

"  Well,  whatever  laws  one  sect  or  another  makes, 
the  woman's  attitude  toward  the  priest  survives. 
She  desires  to  see  him  surrounded  by  flower-pots 
and  candles,  to  have  him  smelling  of  musk.  She 
would  like  to  curl  his  hair,  and  weave  garlands  in 
it.  Although  she  is  not  learned  enough  to  have 
ever  heard  of  such  things,  she  intuitively  feels  in  his 
presence  a  sort  of  backwash  of  the  old  pagan  sen 
suality  and  lascivious  mysticism  which  enveloped 
the  priesthood  in  Greek  and  Roman  days.  Ugh  ! 
It  makes  one  sick  !  " 

Dr.  Ledsmar  rose,  as  he  spoke,  and  dismissed 
the  topic  with  a  dry  little  laugh.  "  Come,  let  me 
show  you  round  a  bit,"  he  said.  "  My  shoulder  is 
easier  walking  than  sitting." 

"Have  you  never  written  a  book  yourself?" 
asked  Theron,  getting  to  his  feet. 

"  I  have  a  thing  on  serpent-worship,"  the  scien 
tist  replied,  —  "  written  years  ago." 

327 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"I  can't  tell  you  how  I  should  enjoy  reading 
it,"  urged  the  other. 

The  doctor  laughed  again.  (f  You  '11  have  to 
learn  German,  then,  I  'm  afraid.  It  is  still  in  cir 
culation  in  Germany,  I  believe,  on  its  merits  as  a 
serious  book.  I  have  n't  a  copy  of  the  edition  in 
English.  That  was  all  exhausted  by  collectors 
who  bought  it  for  its  supposed  obscenity,  like 
Burton's  i  Arabian  Nights.'  Come  this  way,  and  I 
will  show  you  my  laboratory." 

They  moved  out  of  the  room,  and  through  a 
passage,  Ledsmar  talking  as  he  led  the  way.  "  I 
took  up  that  subject,  when  I  was  at  college,  by  a 
curious  chance.  I  kept  a  young  monkey  in  my 
rooms,  which  had  been  born  in  captivity.  I 
brought  home  from  a  beer  hall  —  it  was  in  Ger 
many  —  some  pretzels  one  night,  and  tossed  one 
toward  the  monkey.  He  jumped  toward  it,  then 
screamed  and  ran  back  shuddering  with  fright.  I 
could  n't  understand  it  at  first.  Then  I  saw  that 
the  curled  pretzel,  lying  there  on  the  floor,  was 
very  like  a  little  coiled-up  snake.  The  monkey 
had  never  seen  a  snake,  but  it  was  in  his  blood 
to  be  afraid  of  one.  That  incident  changed  my 
whole  life  for  me.  Up  to  that  evening,  I  had 
intended  to  be  a  lawyer." 

Theron  did  not  feel  sure  that  he  had  understood 
the  point  of  the  anecdote.  He  looked  now,  with 
out  much  interest,  at  some  dark  little  tanks  con 
taining  thick  water,  a  row  of  small  glass  cases  with 

328 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

adders  and  other  lesser  reptiles  inside,  and  a  gen 
eral  collection  of  boxes,  jars,  and  similar  receptacles 
connected  with  the  doctor's  pursuits.  Further  on 
was  a  smaller  chamber,  with  a  big  empty  furnace, 
and  shelves  bearing  bottles  and  apparatus  like  a 
drug- store. 

It  was  pleasanter  in  the  conservatory,  —  a  low, 
spacious  structure  with  broad  pathways  between  the 
plants,  and  an  awning  over  the  sunny  side  of  the 
roof.  The  plants  were  mostly  orchids,  he  learned. 
He  had  read  of  them,  but  never  seen  any  be 
fore.  No  doubt  they  were  curious;  but  he  dis 
covered  nothing  to  justify  the  great  fuss  made 
about  them.  The  heat  grew  oppressive  inside,  and 
he  was  glad  to  emerge  into  the  garden.  He 
paused  under  the  grateful  shade  of  a  vine-clad 
trellis,  took  off  his  hat,  and  looked  about 
him  with  a  sigh  of  relief.  Everything  seemed 
old-fashioned  and  natural  and  delightfully  free 
from  pretence  in  the  big,  overgrown  field  of  flowers 
and  shrubs. 

Theron  recalled  with  some  surprise  Celia's 
indictment  of  the  doctor  as  a  man  with  no  poetry 
in  his  soul.  "  You  must  be  extremely  fond 
of  flowers,"  he  remarked. 

Dr.  Ledsmar  shrugged  his  well  shoulder.  "  They 
have  their  points,"  he  said  briefly.  "These  are 
all  dioecious  here.  Over  beyond  are  monoecious 
species.  My  work  is  to  test  the  probabilities  for 
or  against  Darwin's  theory  that  hermaphroditism 

329 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

in   plants   is  a  late    by-product  of  these    earlier 
forms." 

"And  is  his  theory  right?"  asked  Mr.  Ware, 
with  a  polite  show  of  interest. 

"  We  may  know  in  the  course  of  three  or  four 
hundred  years,"  replied  Ledsmar.  He  looked  up 
into  his  guest's  face  with  a  quizzical  half- smile. 
"  That  is  a  very  brief  period  for  observation  when 
such  a  complicated  question  as  sex  is  involved,"  he 
added.  "We  have  been  studying  the  female  of 
our  own  species  for  some  hundreds  of  thousands 
of  years,  and  we  have  n't  arrived  at  the  most 
elementary  rules  governing  her  actions." 

They  had  moved  along  to  a  bed  of  tall  plants, 
the  more  forward  of  which  were  beginning  to  show 
bloom.  "  Here  another  task  will  begin  next 
month,"  the  doctor  observed.  "These  are  salvias, 
pentstemons,  and  antirrhinums,  or  snapdragons, 
planted  very  thick  for  the  purpose.  Humble-bees 
bore  holes  through  their  base,  to  save  the  labor  of 
climbing  in  and  out  of  the  flowers,  and  we  don't 
quite  know  yet  why  some  hive-bees  discover  and 
utilize  these  holes  at  once,  while  others  never  do. 
It  may  be  merely  the  old-fogy  conservatism  of 
the  individual,  or  there  may  be  a  law  in  it." 

These  seemed  very  paltry  things  for  a  man  of 
such  wisdom  to  bother  his  head  about.  Theron 
looked,  as  he  was  bidden,  at  the  rows  of  hives 
shining  in  the  hot  sun  on  a  bench  along  the  wall, 
but  offered  no  comment  beyond  a  casual,  "  My 

330 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

mother  was  always  going  to  keep  bees,  but  some 
how  she  never  got  around  to  it.  They  say  it  pays 
very  well,  though." 

"The  discovery  of  the  reason  why  no  bee  will 
touch  the  nectar  of  the  Epipactis  latifolia,  though 
it  is  sweet  to  our  taste,  and  wasps  are  greedy  for  it, 
would 'pay,"  commented  the  doctor.  "Not  like  a 
blue  rhododendron,  in  mere  money,  but  in  recog 
nition.  Lots  of  men  have  achieved  a  half-column 
in  the  '  Encyclopedia  Britannica '  on  a  smaller  basis 
than  that." 

They  stood  now  at  the  end  of  the  garden, 
before  a  small,  dilapidated  summer-house.  On  the 
bench  inside,  facing  him,  Theron  saw  a  strange 
recumbent  figure  stretched  at  full  length,  appar 
ently  sound  asleep,  or  it  might  be  dead.  Looking 
closer,  with  a  startled  surprise,  he  made  out  the 
shaven  skull  and  outlandish  garb  of  a  Chinaman. 
He  turned  toward  his  guide  in  the  expectation  of 
a  scene. 

The  doctor  had  already  taken  out  a  note -book 
and  pencil,  and  was  drawing  his  watch  from 
his  pocket.  He  stepped  into  the  summer-house, 
and,  lifting  the  Oriental's  limp  arm,  took  account 
of  his  pulse.  Then,  with  head  bowed  low,  side- 
wise,  he  listened  for  the  heart-action.  Finally, 
he  somewhat  brusquely  pushed  back  one  of  the 
Chinaman's  eyelids,  and  made  a  minute  inspection 
of  what  the  operation  disclosed.  Returning  to  the 
light,  he  inscribed  some  notes  in  his  book,  put  it 

331 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

back  in  his  pocket,  and  came  out.  In  answer  to 
Theron's  marvelling  stare,  he  pointed  toward  a 
pipe  of  odd  construction  lying  on  the  floor  beneath 
the  sleeper. 

"This  is  one  of  my  regular  afternoon  duties," 
he  explained,  again  with  the  whimsical  half-smile. 
"  I  am  increasing  his  dose  monthly  by  regular 
stages,  and  the  results  promise  to  be  rather  remark 
able.  Heretofore,  observations  have  been  made 
mostly  on  diseased  or  morbidly  deteriorated  sub 
jects.  This  fellow  of  mine  is  strong  as  an  ox, 
perfectly  nourished,  and  watched  over  intelligently. 
He  can  assimilate  opium  enough  to  kill  you  and 
me  and  every  other  vertebrate  creature  on  the 
premises,  without  turning  a  hair,  and  he  has  n't 
got  even  fairly  under  way  yet." 

The  thing  was  unpleasant,  and  the  young  min 
ister  turned  away.  They  walked  together  up  the 
path  toward  the  house.  His  mind  was  full  now  of 
the  hostile  things  which  Celia  had  said  about  the 
doctor.  He  had  vaguely  sympathized  with  her 
then,  upon  no  special  knowledge  of  his  own.  Now 
he  felt  that  his  sentiments  were  vehemently  in 
accord  with  hers.  The  doctor  was  a  beast. 

And  yet  —  as  they  moved  slowly  along  through 
the  garden  the  thought  took  sudden  shape  in  his 
mind  —  it  would  be  only  justice  for  him  to  get  also 
the  doctor's  opinion  of  Celia.  Even  while  they 
offended  and  repelled  him,  he  could  not  close  his 
eyes  to  the  fact  that  the  doctor's  experiments  and 

332 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

occupations  were  those  of  a  patient  and  exact  man 
of  science,  —  a  philosopher.  And  what  he  had 
said  about  women,  —  there  was  certainly  a  great 
deal  of  acumen  and  shrewd  observation  in  that. 
If  he  would  only  say  what  he  really  thought  about 
Celia,  and  about  her  relations  with  the  priest ! 
Yes,  Theron  recognized  now  there  was  nothing 
else  that  he  so  much  needed  light  upon  as  those 
puzzling  ties  between  Celia  and  Father  Forbes. 

He  paused,  with  a  simulated  curiosity,  about 
one  of  the  flower-beds.  "Speaking  of  women 
and  religion,"  —  he  began,  in  as  casual  a  tone  as 
he  could  command,  —  "I  notice  curiously  enough 
in  my  own  case,  that  as  I  develop  in  what  you 
may  call  the  —  the  other  direction,  my  wife,  who 
formerly  was  not  especially  devoted,  is  being 
strongly  attracted  by  the  most  unthinking  and 
hysterical  side  of — of  our  church  system." 

The  doctor  looked  at  him,  nodded,  and  stooped 
to  nip  some  buds  from  a  stalk  in  the  bed. 

"And  another  case,"  Theron  went  on  —  "of 
course  it  was  all  so  new  and  strange  to  me  —  but 
the  position  which  Miss  Madden  seems  to  occupy 
about  the  Catholic  Church  here  —  I  suppose  you 
had  her  in  mind  when  you  spoke." 

Ledsmar  stood  up.  "My  mind  has  better 
things  to  busy  itself  with  than  mad  asses  of  that 
description,"  he  replied.  "She  is  not  worth  talk 
ing  about,  —  a  mere  bundle  of  egotism,  ignorance, 
and  red-headed  lewdness.  If  she  were  even  a 

333 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

type,  she  might  be  worth  considering ;  but  she  is 
simply  an  abnormal  sport,  with  a  little  brain  addled 
by  notions  that  she  is  like  Hypatia,  and  a  large 
impudence  rendered  intolerable  by  the  fact  that 
she  has  money.  Her  father  is  a  decent  man.  He 
ought  to  have  her  whipped." 

Mr.  Ware  drew  himself  erect,  as  he  listened  to 
these  outrageous  words.  It  would  be  unmanly,  he 
felt,  to  allow  such  comments  upon  an  absent  friend 
to  pass  unrebuked.  Yet  there  was  the  courtesy 
due  to  a  host  to  be  considered.  His  mind, 
fluttering  between  these  two  extremes,  alighted 
abruptly  upon  a  compromise.  He  would  speak  so 
as  to  show  his  disapproval,  yet  not  so  as  to  prevent 
his  finding  out  what  he  wanted  to  know.  The 
desire  to  hear  Ledsmar  talk  about  Celia  and  the 
priest  seemed  now  to  have  possessed  him  for  a 
long  time,  to  have  dictated  his  unpremeditated 
visit  out  here,  to  have  been  growing  in  intensity 
all  the  while  he  pretended  to  be  interested  in 
orchids  and  bees  and  the  drugged  Chinaman. 
It  tugged  passionately  at  his  self-control  as  he 
spoke. 

"  I  cannot  in  the  least  assent  to  your  characteri 
zation  of  the  lady,"  he  began  with  rhetorical 
dignity. 

"  Bless  me  !  "  interposed  the  doctor,  with  decep 
tive  cheerfulness,  "  that  is  not  required  of  you  at  all. 
It  is  a  strictly  personal  opinion,  offered  merely  as  a 
contribution  to  the  general  sum  of  hypotheses." 

334 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"But,"  Theron  went  on,  feeling  his  way,  "of 
course,  I  gathered  that  evening  that  you  had 
prejudices  in  the  matter ;  but  these  are  rather 
apart  from  the  point  I  had  in  view.  We  were 
speaking,  you  will  remember,  of  the  traditional 
attitude  of  women  toward  priests,  —  wanting  to 
curl  their  hair  and  put  flowers  in  it,  you  know,  — 
and  that  suggested  to  me  some  individual  illustra 
tions,  and  it  occurred  to  me  to  wonder  just  what 
were  the  relations  between  Miss  Madden  and  — 
and  Father  Forbes.  She  said  this  morning,  for 
instance,  —  I  happened  to  meet  her,  quite  by 
accident,  —  that  she  was  going  to  the  church  to 
practise  a  new  piece,  and  that  she  could  have 
Father  Forbes  to  herself  all  day.  Now  that  would 
be  quite  an  impossible  remark  in  our  —  that  is, 
in  any  Protestant  circles  —  and  purely  as  a  matter 
of  comparison,  I  was  curious  to  ask  you  just  how 
much  there  was  in  it.  I  ask  you,  because  going 
there  so  much  you  have  had  exceptional  oppor 
tunities  for — " 

A  sharp  exclamation  from  his  companion  inter 
rupted  the  clergyman's  hesitating  monologue.  It 
began  like  a  high-pitched,  violent  word,  but 
dwindled  suddenly  into  a  groan  of  pain.  The 
doctor's  face,  too,  which  had  on  the  flash  of 
Theron's  turning  seemed  given  over  to  unmixed 
anger,  took  on  an  expression  of  bodily  suffering 
instead. 

"  My  shoulder  has  grown  all  at  once  excessively 

335 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

painful,"  he  said  hastily.     "  I  'm  afraid  I  must  ask 
you  to  excuse  me,  Mr.  Ware." 

Carrying  the  afflicted  side  with  ostentatious 
caution,  he  led  the  way  without  ado  round  the 
house  to  the  front  gate  on  the  road.  He  had  put 
his  left  hand  under  his  coat  to  press  it  against  his 
aching  shoulder,  and  his  right  hung  palpably  help 
less.  This  rendered  it  impossible  for  him  to  shake 
hands  with  his  guest  in  parting. 

"  You  're  sure  there  's  nothing  I  can  do,"  said 
Theron,  lingering  on  the  outer  side  of  the  gate. 
"  I  used  to  rub  my  father's  shoulders  and  back ; 
I 'd  gladly  — " 

"Oh,  not  for  worlds!"  groaned  the  doctor. 
His  anguish  was  so  impressive  that  Theron,  as  he 
walked  down  the  road,  quite  missed  the  fact  that 
there  had  been  no  invitation  to  come  again. 

Dr.  Ledsmar  stood  for  a  minute  or  two,  his 
gaze  meditatively  following  the  retreating  figure. 
Then  he  went  in,  opening  the  front  door  with  his 
right  hand,  and  carrying  himself  once  more  as  if 
there  were  no  such  thing  as  rheumatism  in  the 
world.  He  wandered  on  through  the  hall  into 
the  laboratory,  and  stopped  in  front  of  the  row  of 
little  tanks  full  of  water. 

Some  deliberation  was  involved  in  whatever  his 
purpose  might  be,  for  he  looked  from  one  tank  to 
another  with  a  pondering,  dilatory  gaze.  At  last 
he  plunged  his  hand  into  the  opaque  fluid  and 
drew  forth  a  long,  slim,  yellowish-green  lizard,  with 

336 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

a  coiling,  sinuous  tail  and  a  pointed,  evil  head. 
The  reptile  squirmed  and  doubled  itself  backward 
around  his  wrist,  darting  out  and  in  with  dizzy 
swiftness  its  tiny  forked  tongue. 

The  doctor  held  the  thing  up  to  the  light,  and, 
scrutinizing  it  through  his  spectacles,  nodded  his 
head  in  sedate  approval.  A  grim  smile  curled  in 
his  beard. 

"  Yes,  you  are  the  type,"  he  murmured  to  it, 
with  evident  enjoyment  in  the  conceit.  "  Your 
name  is  n't  Johnny  any  more.  It 's  the  Rev. 
Theron  Ware." 


*»  337 


CHAPTER  XXII 

THE  annual  camp- meeting  of  the  combined 
Methodist  districts  of  Octavius  and  Thessaly  was 
held  this  year  in  the  second  half  of  September, 
a  little  later  than  usual.  Of  the  nine  days  devoted 
to  this  curious  survival  of  primitive  Wesleyanism, 
the  fifth  fell  upon  a  Saturday.  On  the  noon  of 
that  day  the  Rev.  Theron  Ware  escaped  for  some 
hours  from  the  burden  of  work  and  incessant 
observation  which  he  shared  with  twenty  other 
preachers,  and  walked  alone  in  the  woods. 

The  scene  upon  which  he  turned  his  back  was 
one  worth  looking  at.  A  spacious,  irregularly 
defined  clearing  in  the  forest  lay  level  as  a  tennis- 
court,  under  the  soft  haze  of  autumn  sunlight.  In 
the  centre  was  a  large,  roughly  constructed  frame 
building,  untouched  by  paint,  but  stained  and 
weather-beaten  with  time.  Behind  it  were  some 
lines  of  horse-sheds,  and  still  further  on  in  that 
direction,  where  the  trees  began,  the  eye  caught 
fragmentary  glimpses  of  low  roofs  and  the  fronts  of 
tiny  cottages,  withdrawn  from  full  view  among  the 
saplings  and  underbrush.  At  the  other  side  of  the 
clearing,  fully  fourscore  tents  were  pitched,  some 

338 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

gray  and  mended,  others  dazzlingly  white  in  their 
newness.  The  more  remote  of  these  tents  fell 
into  an  orderly  arrangement  of  semi-circular  form, 
facing  that  part  of  the  engirdling  woods  where  the 
trees  were  largest,  and  their  canopy  of  overhanging 
foliage  was  lifted  highest  from  the  ground.  Inside 
this  half-ring  of  tents  were  many  rounded  rows  of 
benches,  which  followed  in  narrowing  lines  the 
idea  of  an  amphitheatre  cut  in  two.  In  the  centre, 
just  under  the  edge  of  the  roof  of  boughs,  rose  a 
wooden  pagoda,  in  form  not  unlike  an  open-air 
stand  for  musicians.  In  front  of  this,  and  leading 
from  it  on  the  level  of  its  floor,  there  projected  a 
platform,  railed  round  with  aggressively  rustic 
woodwork.  The  nearest  benches  came  close 
about  this  platform. 

At  the  hour  when  Theron  started  away,  there 
were  few  enough  signs  of  life  about  this  encamp 
ment.  The  four  or  five  hundred  people  who  were 
in  constant  residence  were  eating  their  dinners 
in  the  big  boarding-house,  or  the  cottages  or  the 
tents.  It  was  not  the  time  of  day  for  strangers. 
Even  when  services  were  in  progress  by  daylight, 
the  regular  attendants  did  not  make  much  of  a 
show,  huddled  in  a  gray-black  mass  at  the  front 
of  the  auditorium,  by  comparison  with  the  great 
green  and  blue  expanses  of  nature  about  them. 

The  real  spectacle  was  in  the  evening,  when, 
as  the  shadows  gathered,  big  clusters  of  kerosene 
torches,  hung  high  on  the  trees  facing  the  audience, 

339 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

were  lighted.  The  falling  darkness  magnified  the 
glow  of  the  lights,  and  the  size  and  importance  of 
what  they  illumined.  The  preacher,  bending  for 
ward  over  the  rails  of  the  platform,  and  fastening 
his  eyes  upon  the  abashed  faces  of  those  on  the 
"anxious  seat"  beneath  him,  borrowed  an  effect 
of  druidical  mystery  from  the  wall  of  blackness 
about  him,  from  the  flickering  reflections  on  the 
branches  far  above,  from  the  cool  night  air  which 
stirred  across  the  clearing.  The  change  was  in 
the  blood  of  those  who  saw  and  heard  him,  too. 
The  decorum  and  half-heartedness  of  their  devo 
tions  by  day  deepened  under  the  glare  of  the 
torches  into  a  fervent  enthusiasm,  even  before 
the  services  began.  And  if  there  was  in  the  rustic 
pulpit  a  man  whose  prayers  or  exhortations  could 
stir  their  pulses,  they  sang  and  groaned  and 
bellowed  out  their  praises  with  an  almost  barbar 
ous  license,  such  as  befitted  the  wilderness. 

But  in  the  evening  not  all  were  worshippers. 
For  a  dozen  miles  round  on  the  country-side, 
young  farm- workers  and  their  girls  regarded  the 
camp-meeting  as  perhaps  the  chief  event  of  the 
year,  —  no  more  to  be  missed  than  the  country 
fair  or  the  circus,  and  offering,  from  many  points 
of  view,  more  opportunities  for  genuine  enjoyment 
than  either.  Their  behavior  when  they  came  was 
pretty  bad,  —  not  the  less  so  because  all  the  rules 
established  by  the  Presiding  Elders  for  the  regu 
lation  of  strangers  took  it  for  granted  that  they 

340 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

would  act  as  viciously  as  they  knew  how.  These 
sight-seers  sometimes  ventured  to  occupy  the  back 
benches,  where  the  light  was  dim.  More  often 
they  stood  outside,  in  the  circular  space  between 
the  tents  and  the  benches,  and  mingled  cat-calls, 
drovers'  yelps,  and  all  sorts  of  mocking  cries  and 
noises  with  the  "  Amens  "  of  the  earnest  congre 
gation.  Their  rough  horse-play  on  the  fringe  of  the 
sanctified  gathering  was  grievous  enough ;  every 
body  knew  that  much  worse  things  went  on 
further  out  in  the  surrounding  darkness.  Indeed, 
popular  report  gave  to  these  external  phases  of  the 
camp -meeting  an  even  more  evil  fame  than  attached 
to  the  later  moonlight  husking-bees,  or  the  least 
reputable  of  the  midwinter  dances  at  Dave  Ran 
dall's  low  halfway  house. 

Cynics  said  that  the  Methodists  found  conso 
lation  for  this  scandal  in  the  large  income  they  de 
rived  from  their  unruly  visitors'  gate-money.  This 
was  unfair.  No  doubt  the  money  played  its  part, 
but  there  was  something  else  far  more  important. 
The  pious  dwellers  in  the  camp,  intent  upon  reviv 
ing  in  their  poor  modern  way  the  character  and 
environment  of  the  heroic  early  days,  felt  the  need 
of  just  this  hostile  and  scoffing  mob  about  them  to 
bring  out  the  spirit  they  sought.  Theirs  was  pre 
eminently  a  fighting  religion,  which  languished  in 
peaceful  fair  weather,  but  flamed  high  in  the 
storm.  The  throng  of  loafers  and  light-minded 
worldlings  of  both  sexes,  with  their  jeering  inter- 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ruptions  and  lewd  levity  of  conduct,  brought  upon 
the  scene  a  kind  of  visible  personal  devil,  with 
whom  the  chosen  could  do  battle  face  to  face. 
The  daylight  services  became  more  and  more  per 
functory,  as  the  sojourn  in  the  woods  ran  its  course, 
and  interest  concentrated  itself  upon  the  night 
meetings,  for  the  reason  that  then  came  the  fierce 
wrestle  with  a  Beelzebub  of  flesh  and  blood.  And 
it  was  not  so  one-sided  a  contest,  either ! 

No  evening  passed  without  its  victories  for  the 
pulpit.  Careless  or  mischievous  young  people 
who  were  pushed  into  the  foremost  ranks  of  the 
mockers,  and  stood  grinning  and  grimacing  under 
the  lights,  would  of  a  sudden  feel  a  spell  clamped 
upon  them.  They  would  hear  a  strange,  quaver 
ing  note  in  the  preacher's  voice,  catch  the  sense  of 
a  piercing,  soul-commanding  gleam  in  his  eye.  — 
not  at  all  to  be  resisted.  These  occult  forces 
would  take  control  of  them,  drag  them  forward  as 
in  a  dream  to  the  benches  under  the  pulpit,  and 
abase  them  there  like  worms  in  the  dust.  And 
then  the  preacher  would  descend,  and  the  elders 
advance,  and  the  torch-fires  would  sway  and  dip 
before  the  wind  of  the  mighty  roar  that  went  up  in 
triumph  from  the  brethren. 

These  combats  with  Satan  at  close  quarters,  if 
they  made  the  week-day  evenings  exciting,  reacted 
with  an  effect  of  crushing  dulness  upon  the  Sun 
day  services.  The  rule  was  to  admit  no  strangers 
to  the  grounds  from  Saturday  night  to  Monday 

342 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

morning.  Every  year  attempts  were  made  to 
rescind  or  modify  this  rule,  and  this  season  at 
least  three-fourths  of  the  laymen  in  attendance 
had  signed  a  petition  in  favor  of  opening  the  gates. 
The  two  Presiding  Elders,  supported  by  a  dozen 
of  the  older  preachers,  resisted  the  change,  and 
they  had  the  backing  of  the  more  bigoted  section 
of  the  congregation  from  Octavius.  The  con 
troversy  reached  a  point  where  Theron's  Presiding 
Elder  threatened  to  quit  the  grounds,  and  the 
leaders  of  the  open- Sunday  movement  spoke 
freely  of  the  ridiculous  figure  which  its  cranks  and 
fanatics  made  poor  Methodism  cut  in  the  eyes  of 
modern  go-ahead  American  civilization.  Then 
Theron  Ware  saw  his  opportunity,  and  preached 
an  impromptu  sermon  upon  the  sanctity  of  the 
Sabbath,  which  ended  all  discussion.  Sometimes 
its  arguments  seemed  to  be  on  one  side,  some 
times  on  the  other,  but  always  they  were  clothed 
with  so  serene  a  beauty  of  imagery,  and  moved  in 
such  a  lofty  and  rarefied  atmosphere  of  spiritual 
exaltation,  that  it  was  impossible  to  link  them  to  so 
sordid  a  thing  as  this  question  of  gate-money. 
When  he  had  finished,  nobody  wanted  the  gates 
opened.  The  two  factions  found  that  the  differ 
ence  between  them  had  melted  out  of  existence. 
They  sat  entranced  by  the  charm  of  the  sermon ; 
then,  glancing  around  at  the  empty  benches, 
glaringly  numerous  in  the  afternoon  sunlight,  they 
whispered  regrets  that  ten  thousand  people  had 

343 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

not  been  there  to  hear  that  marvellous  discourse. 
Theron's  conquest  was  of  exceptional  dimensions. 
The  majority,  whose  project  he  had  defeated,  were 
strangers  who  appreciated  and  admired  his  effort 
most.  The  little  minority  of  his  own  flock,  though 
less  susceptible  to  the  influence  of  graceful  diction 
and  delicately  balanced  rhetoric,  were  proud  of  the 
distinction  he  had  reflected  upon  them,  and  de 
lighted  with  him  for  having  won  their  fight.  The 
Presiding  Elders  wrung  his  hand  with  a  significant 
grip.  The  extremists  of  his  own  charge  beamed 
friendship  upon  him  for  the  first  time.  He  was 
the  veritable  hero  of  the  week. 

The  prestige  of  this  achievement  made  it  the 
easier  for  Theron  to  get  away  by  himself  next  day, 
and  walk  in  the  woods.  A  man  of  such  power  had 
a  right  to  solitude.  Those  who  noted  his  de 
parture  from  the  camp  remembered  with  pleasure 
that  he  was  to  preach  again  on  the  morrow.  He 
was  going  to  commune  with  God  in  the  depths  oi 
the  forest,  that  the  Message  next  day  might  be 
clearer  and  more  luminous  still. 

Theron  strolled  for  a  little,  with  an  air  of  aim- 
lessness,  until  he  was  well  outside  the  more  or  less 
frequented  neighborhood  of  the  camp.  Then  he 
looked  at  the  sun  and  the  lay  of  the  land  with  that 
informing  scrutiny  of  which  the  farm-bred  boy 
never  loses  the  trick,  turned,  and  strode  at  a  rat 
tling  pace  down  the  hillside.  He  knew  nothing 
personally  of  this  piece  of  woodland,  —  a  spur  of 

344 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  great  Adirondack  wilderness  thrust  southward 
into  the  region  of  homesteads  and  dairies  and  hop- 
fields,  —  but  he  had  prepared  himself  by  a  study  of 
the  map,  and  he  knew  where  he  wanted  to  go. 
Very  soon  he  hit  upon  the  path  he  had  counted 
upon  finding,  and  at  this  he  quickened  his  gait. 

Three  months  of  the  new  life  had  wrought 
changes  in  Theron.  He  bore  himself  more  erectly, 
for  one  thing ;  his  shoulders  were  thrown  back, 
and  seemed  thicker.  The  alteration  was  even 
more  obvious  in  his  face.  The  effect  of  lank, 
wistful,  sallow  juvenility  had  vanished.  It  was  the 
countenance  of  a  mature,  well-fed,  and  confident 
man,  firmer  and  more  rounded  in  its  outlines,  and 
with  a  glow  of  health  on  its  whole  surface.  Under 
the  chin  were  the  suggestions  of  fulness  which  be 
speak  an  easy  mind.  His  clothes  were  new ;  the 
frock-coat  fitted  him,  and  the  thin,  dark-colored 
autumn  overcoat,  with  its  silk  lining  exposed  at  the 
breast,  gave  a  masculine  bulk  and  shape  to  his 
figure.  He  wore  a  shining  tall  hat,  and,  in  haste 
though  he  was,  took  pains  not  to  knock  it  against 
low-hanging  branches. 

All  had  gone  well  —  more  than  well  —  with  him. 
The  second  Quarterly  Conference  had  passed  with 
out  a  ripple.  Both  the  attendance  and  the  collec 
tions  at  his  church  were  larger  than  ever  before, 
and  the  tone  of  the  congregation  toward  him  was 
altered  distinctly  for  the  better.  As  for  himself,  he 
viewed  with  astonished  delight  the  progress  he  had 

345 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

made  in  his  own  estimation.  He  had  taken  Sister 
Soulsby's  advice,  and  the  results  were  already  won 
derful.  He  had  put  aside,  once  and  for  all,  the 
thousand  foolish  trifles  and  childish  perplexities 
which  formerly  had  racked  his  brain,  and  worried 
him  out  of  sleep  and  strength.  He  borrowed  all 
sorts  of  books  boldly  now  from  the  Octavius  public 
library,  and  could  swim  with  a  calm  mastery  and 
enjoyment  upon  the  deep  waters  into  which  Draper 
and  Lecky  and  Laing  and  the  rest  had  hurled  him. 
He  dallied  pleasurably,  a  little  languorously,  with  a 
dozen  aspects  of  the  case  against  revealed  religion, 
ranging  from  the  mild  heterodoxy  of  Andover's 
qualms  to  the  rude  IngersolPs  rollicking  negation  of 
God  himself,  as  a  woman  of  coquetry  might  play 
with  as  many  would-be  lovers.  They  amused  him ; 
they  were  all  before  him  to  choose ;  and  he  was 
free  to  postpone  indefinitely  the  act  of  selection. 
There  was  a  sense  of  the  luxurious  in  this  position 
which  softened  bodily  as  well  as  mental  fibres. 
He  ceased  to  grow  indignant  at  things  below  or 
outside  his  standards,  and  he  bought  a  small  book 
which  treated  of  the  care  of  the  hand  and  finger 
nails. 

Alice  had  accepted  with  deference  his  explana 
tion  that  shapely  hands  played  so  important  a 
part  in  pulpit  oratory.  For  that  matter,  she  now 
accepted  whatever  he  said  or  did  with  admirable 
docility.  It  was  months  since  he  could  remember 
her  venturing  upon  a  critical  attitude  toward  him. 

346 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

She  had  not  wished  to  leave  home,  for  the  seaside 
or  any  other  resojt,  during  the  summer,  but  had 
worked  outside  in  her  garden  more  than  usual. 
This  was  inexpensive,  and  it  seemed  to  do  her  as 
much  good  as  a  holiday  could  have  done.  Her 
new  devotional  zeal  was  now  quite  an  old  thing ; 
it  had  not  slackened  at  all  from  the  revival  pitch. 
At  the  outset  she  had  tried  several  times  to  talk 
with  her  husband  upon  this  subject.  He  had 
discouraged  conversation  about  her  soul  and  its 
welfare,  at  first  obliquely,  then,  under  compulsion, 
with  some  directness.  His  thoughts  were  ab 
sorbed,  he  said,  by  the  contemplation  of  vast, 
abstract  schemes  of  creation  and  the  government 
of  the  universe,  and  it  only  diverted  and  embar 
rassed  his  mind  to  try  to  fasten  it  upon  the  details 
of  personal  salvation.  Thereafter  the  topic  was 
not  broached  between  them. 

She  bestowed  a  good  deal  of  attention,  too, 
upon  her  piano.  The  knack  of  a  girlish  nimble- 
ness  of  touch  had  returned  to  her  after  a  few 
weeks,  and  she  made  music  which  Theron  sup 
posed  was  very  good,  —  for  her.  It  pleased  him, 
at  all  events,  when  he  sat  and  listened  to  it ;  but 
he  had  a  far  greater  pleasure,  as  he  listened,  in 
dwelling  upon  the  memories  of  the  yellow  and  blue 
room  which  the  sounds  always  brought  up.  Al 
though  three  months  had  passed,  Thurston's  had 
never  asked  for  the  first  payment  on  the  piano,  or 
even  sent  in  a  bill.  This  impressed  him  as  being 

347 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

peculiarly  graceful  behavior  on  his  part,  and  he 
recognized  its  delicacy  by  not  going  near  Thurs- 
ton's  at  all. 

An  hour's  sharp  walk,  occasionally  broken  by 
short  cuts  across  open  pastures,  but  for  the  most 
part  on  forest  paths,  brought  Theron  to  the  brow 
of  a  small  knoll,  free  from  underbrush,  and  covered 
sparsely  with  beech-trees.  The  ground  was  soft 
with  moss  and  the  powdered  remains  of  last  year's 
foliage ;  the  leaves  above  him  were  showing  the 
first  yellow  stains  of  autumn.  A  sweet  smell  of 
ripening  nuts  was  thick  upon  the  air,  and  busy 
rustlings  and  chirpings  through  the  stillness  told 
how  the  chipmunks  and  squirrels  were  attending 
to  their  harvest. 

Theron  had  no  ears  for  these  noises  of  the 
woodland.  He  had  halted,  and  was  searching 
through  the  little  vistas  offered  between  the  stout 
gray  trunks  of  the  beeches  for  some  sign  of  a  more 
sophisticated  sort.  Yes !  there  were  certainly 
voices  to  be  heard,  down  in  the  hollow.  And 
now,  beyond  all  possibility  of  mistake,  there  came 
up  to  him  the  low,  rhythmic  throb  of  music. 
It  was  the  merest  faint  murmur  of  music,  made  up 
almost  wholly  of  groaning  bass  notes,  but  it  was 
enough.  He  moved  down  the  slope,  swiftly  at 
first,  then  with  increasing  caution.  The  sounds 
grew  louder  as  he  advanced,  until  he  could  hear 
the  harmony  of  the  other  strings  in  its  place 
beside  the  uproar  of  the  big  fiddles,  and  distin- 

348 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

guish  from  both  the  measured  noise  of  many  feet 
moving  as  one. 

He  reached  a  place  from  which,  himself  unob 
served,  he  could  overlook  much  of  what  he  had 
come  to  see. 

The  bottom  of  the  glade  below  him  lay  out  in 
the  full  sunshine,  as  flat  and  as  velvety  in  its  fresh 
greenness  as  a  garden  lawn.  Its  open  expanse 
was  big  enough  to  accommodate  several  distinct 
crowds,  and  here  the  crowds  were,  —  one  massed 
about  an  enclosure  in  which  young  men  were  play 
ing  at  football,  another  gathered  further  off  in  a 
horse-shoe  curve  at  the  end  of  a  baseball  diamond, 
and  a  third  thronging  at  a  point  where  the  shade 
of  overhanging  woods  began,  focussed  upon  a  cen 
tre  of  interest  which  Theron  could  not  make  out. 
Closer  at  hand,  where  a  shallow  stream  rippled 
along  over  its  black-slate  bed,  some  little  boys, 
with  legs  bared  to  the  thighs,  were  paddling  about, 
under  the  charge  of  two  men  clad  in  long  black 
gowns.  There  were  others  of  these  frocked  moni 
tors  scattered  here  and  there  upon  the  scene,  — 
pallid,  close-shaven,  monkish  figures,  who  none 
the  less  wore  modern  hats,  and  superintended  with 
knowledge  the  games  of  the  period.  Theron  re 
membered  that  these  were  the  Christian  Brothers, 
the  semi-monastic  teachers  of  the  Catholic  school. 

And  this  was  the  picnic  of  the  Catholics  of 
Octavius.  He  gazed  in  mingled  amazement  and 
exhilaration  upon  the  spectacle.  There  seemed  to 

349 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

be  literally  thousands  of  people  on  the  open  fields 
before  him,  and  apparently  there  were  still  other 
thousands  in  the  fringes  of  the  woods  round  about. 
The  noises  which  arose  from  this  multitude  —  the 
shouts  of  the  lads  in  the  water,  the  playful  squeals 
of  the  girls  in  the  swings,  the  fused  uproar  of  the 
more  distant  crowds,  and  above  all  the  diligent, 
ordered  strains  of  the  dance-music  proceeding 
from  some  invisible  distance  in  the  greenwood  — 
charmed  his  ears  with  their  suggestion  of  universal 
merriment.  He  drew  a  long  breath  —  half  pleas 
ure,  half  wistful  regret  —  as  he  remembered  that 
other  gathering  in  the  forest  which  he  had  left 
behind. 

At  any  rate,  it  should  be  well  behind  him  to-day, 
whatever  the  morrow  might  bring  !  Evidently  he 
was  on  the  wrong  side  of  the  circle  for  the  head 
quarters  of  the  festivities.  He  turned  and  walked 
to  the  right  through  the  beeches,  making  a  de"tour, 
under  cover,  of  the  crowds  at  play.  At  last  he 
rounded  the  long  oval  of  the  clearing,  and  found 
himself  at  the  very  edge  of  that  largest  throng  of 
all,  which  had  been  too  far  away  for  comprehen 
sion  at  the  beginning.  There  was  no  mystery 
now.  A  rough,  narrow  shed,  fully  fifty  feet  in 
length,  imposed  itself  in  an  arbitrary  line  across 
the  face  of  this  crowd,  dividing  it  into  two  com 
pact  halves.  Inside  this  shed,  protected  all  round 
by  a  waist-high  barrier  of  boards,  on  top  of  which 
ran  a  flat,  table -like  covering,  were  twenty  men  in 

35° 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

their  shirt-sleeves,  toiling  ceaselessly  to  keep  abreast 
of  the  crowd's  thirst  for  beer.  The  actions  of 
these  bar- tenders  greatly  impressed  Theron.  They 
moved  like  so  many  machines,  using  one  hand, 
apparently,  to  take  money  and  give  change,  and 
with  the  other  incessantly  sweeping  off  rows  of 
empty  glasses,  and  tossing  forward  in  their  place 
fresh,  foaming  glasses  five  at  a  time.  Hundreds 
of  arms  and  hands  were  continually  stretched  out, 
on  both  sides  of  the  shed,  toward  this  streaming 
bar,  and  through  the  babel  of  eager  cries  rose 
without  pause  the  racket  of  mallets  tapping  new 
kegs. 

Theron  had  never  seen  any  considerable  number 
of  his  fellow-citizens  engaged  in  drinking  lager 
beer  before.  His  surprise  at  the  facility  of  those 
behind  the  bar  began  to  yield,  upon  observation, 
to  a  profound  amazement  at  the  thirst  of  those 
before  it.  The  same  people  seemed  to  be  always 
in  front,  emptying  the  glasses  faster  than  the  busy 
men  inside  could  replenish  them,  and  clamoring 
tirelessly  for  more.  New-comers  had  to  force  their 
way  to  the  bar  by  violent  efforts,  and  once  there 
they  stayed  until  pushed  bodily  aside.  There 
were  actually  women  to  be  seen  here  and  there  in 
the  throng,  elbowing  and  shoving  like  the  rest  for 
a  place  at  the  front.  Some  of  the  more  gallant 
young  men  fought  their  way  outward,  from  time  to 
time,  carrying  for  safety  above  their  heads  glasses 
of  beer  which  they  gave  to  young  and  pretty  girls, 

35' 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

standing  on  the  fringe  of  the  crowd,  among  the 
trees. 

Everywhere  a  remarkable  good-humor  prevailed. 
Once  a  sharp  fight  broke  out,  just  at  the  end  of 
the  bar  nearest  Theron,  and  one  young  man  was 
knocked  down.  A  rush  of  the  onlookers  confused 
everything  before  the  minister's  eyes  for  a  minute, 
and  then  he  saw  the  aggrieved  combatant  up  on 
his  legs  again,  consenting  under  the  kindly  pres 
sure  of  the  crowd  to  shake  hands  with  his  antag 
onist,  and  join  him  in  more  beer.  The  incident 
caught  his  fancy.  There  was  something  very 
pleasingly  human,  he  thought,  in  this  primitive 
readiness  to  resort  to  fisticuffs,  and  this  frank 
and  genial  reconciliation. 

Perhaps  there  was  something  contagious  in  this 
wholesale  display  of  thirst,  for  the  Rev.  Mr.  Ware 
became  conscious  of  a  notion  that  he  should  like 
to  try  a  glass  of  beer.  He  recalled  having  heard 
that  lager  was  really  a  most  harmless  beverage. 
Of  course  it  was  out  of  the  question  that  he  should 
show  himself  at  the  bar.  Perhaps  some  one  would 
bring  him  out  a  glass,  as  if  he  were  a  pretty  girl. 
He  looked  about  for  a  possible  messenger.  Turn 
ing,  he  found  himself  face  to  face  with  two  smiling 
people,  into  whose  eyes  he  stared  for  an  instant  in 
dumfounded  blankness.  Then  his  countenance 
flashed  with  joy,  and  he  held  out  both  hands  in 
greeting.  It  was  Father  Forbes  and  Celia. 

"  We  stole  down  upon  you  unawares,"  said  the 

352 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

priest,  in  his  cheeriest  manner.  He  wore  a  brown 
straw  hat,  and  loose  clothes  hardly  at  all  clerical 
in  form,  and  had  Miss  Madden' s  arm  drawn 
lightly  within  his  own.  "  We  could  barely  believe 
our  eyes,  —  that  it  could  be  you  whom  we  saw, 
here  among  the  sinners  !  " 

"  I  am  in  love  with  your  sinners,"  responded 
Theron,  as  he  shook  hands  with  Celia,  and  trusted 
himself  to  look  fully  into  her  eyes.  "  I  've  had 
five  days  of  the  saints,  over  in  another  part  of  the 
woods,  and  they  've  bored  the  head  off  me." 


**  353 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

AT  the  command  of  Father  Forbes,  a  lad  who 
was  loitering  near  them  went  down  through  the 
throng  to  the  bar,  and  returned  with  three  glasses 
of  beer.  It  pleased  the  Rev.  Mr.  Ware  that  the 
priest  should  have  taken  it  for  granted  that  he 
would  do  as  the  others  did.  He  knocked  his  glass 
against  theirs  in  compliance  with  a  custom  strange 
to  him,  but  which  they  seemed  to  understand  very 
well.  The  beer  itself  was  not  so  agreeable  to  the 
taste  as  he  had  expected,  but  it  was  cold  and 
refreshing. 

When  the  boy  had  returned  with  the  glasses, 
the  three  stood  for  a  moment  in  silence,  medi 
tatively  watching  the  curious  scene  spread  below 
them.  Beyond  the  bar,  Theron  could  catch  now 
through  the  trees  regularly  recurring  glimpses  of 
four  or  five  swings  in  motion.  These  were 
nearest  him,  and  clearest  to  the  vision  as  well,  at 
the  instant  when  they  reached  their  highest  for 
ward  point.  The  seats  were  filled  with  girls, 
some  of  them  quite  grown  young  women,  and 
their  curving  upward  sweep  through  the  air  was 
disclosing  at  its  climax  a  remarkable  profusion  of 
white  skirts  and  black  stockings.  The  sight 

354 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

struck  him  as  indecorous  in  the  extreme,  and  he 
turned  his  eyes  away.  They  met  Celia's;  and 
there  was  something  latent  in  their  brown  depths 
which  prompted  him,  after  a  brief  dalliance  of 
interchanging  glances,  to  look  again  at  the  swings. 

"  That  old  maid  Curran  is  really  too  ridiculous, 
with  those  white  stockings  of  hers,"  remarked 
Celia ;  "  some  friend  ought  to  tell  her  to  dye 
them." 

"  Or  pad  them,"  suggested  Father  Forbes,  with 
a  gay  little  chuckle.  "  I  daresay  the  question  of 
swings  and  ladies'  stockings  hardly  arises  with  you, 
over  at  the  camp-meeting,  Mr.  Ware  ?  " 

Theron  laughed  aloud  at  the  conceit.  "  I 
should  say  not !  "  he  replied. 

"  I  'm  just  dying  to  see  a  camp-meeting  !  "  said 
Celia.  (<  You  hear  such  racy  accounts  of  what 
goes  on  at  them." 

"  Don't  go,  I  beg  of  you  !  "  urged  Theron,  with 
doleful  emphasis.  "  Don't  let 's  even  talk  about 
them.  I  should  like  to  feel  this  afternoon  as  if 
there  was  no  such  thing  within  a  thousand  miles 
of  me  as  a  camp-meeting.  Do  you  know,  all  this 
interests  me  enormously.  It  is  a  revelation  to  me 
to  see  these  thousands  of  good,  decent,  ordinary 
people,  just  frankly  enjoying  themselves  like  human 
beings.  I  suppose  that  in  this  whole  huge  crowd 
there  is  n't  a  single  person  who  will  mention  the 
subject  of  his  soul  to  any  other  person  all  day 
long." 

355 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  I  should  think  the  assumption  was  a  safe  one," 
said  the  priest,  smilingly,  "  unless,"  he  added 
on  after-thought,  "it  be  by  way  of  a  genial 
profanity.  There  used  to  be  some  old  Clare  men 
who  said  *  Hell  to  my  soul ! '  when  they  missed  at 
quoits,  but  I  have  n't  heard  it  for  a  long  time.  I 
daresay  they  're  all  dead." 

"I  shall  never  forget  that  death- bed — where 
I  saw  you  first,"  remarked  Theron,  musingly.  "  I 
date  from  that  experience  a  whole  new  life.  I 
have  been  greatly  struck  lately,  in  reading  our 
'  Northern  Christian  Advocate '  to  see  in  the 
obituary  notices  of  prominent  Methodists  how  over 
and  over  again  it  is  recorded  that  they  got  religion 
in  their  youth  through  being  frightened  by  some 
illness  of  their  own,  or  some  epidemic  about  them. 
The  cholera  year  of  1832  seems  to  have  made 
Methodists  hand  over  fist.  Even  to  this  day  our 
most  successful  revivalists,  those  who  work  conver 
sions  wholesale  wherever  they  go,  do  it  more  by 
frightful  pictures  of  hell- fire  surrounding  the  sin 
ner's  death-bed  than  anything  else.  You  could 
hear  the  same  thing  at  our  camp-meeting  to-night, 
if  you  were  there." 

"  There  is  n't  so  much  difference  as  you  think," 
said  Father  Forbes,  dispassionately.  "  Your  peo 
ple  keep  examining  their  souls,  just  as  children 
keep  pulling  up  the  bulbs  they  have  planted  to  see 
are  there  any  roots  yet.  Our  people  are  more 
satisfied  to  leave  their  souls  alone,  once  they  have 

356 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

been  planted,  so  to  speak,  by  baptism.  But  fear 
of  hell  governs  them  both,  pretty  much  alike.  As 
I  remember  saying  to  you  once  before,  there  is 
really  nothing  new  under  the  sun.  Even  the  say 
ing  is  n't  new.  Though  there  seem  to  have  been 
the  most  tremendous  changes  in  races  and  civili 
zations  and  religions,  stretching  over  many  thou 
sands  of  years,  yet  nothing  is  in  fact  altered  very 
much.  Where  religions  are  concerned,  the  human 
race  are  still  very  like  savages  in  a  dangerous 
wood  in  the  dark,  telling  one  another  ghost  stories 
around  a  camp-fire.  They  have  always  been  like 
that." 

"  What  nonsense  !  "  cried  Celia.  "  I  have  no 
patience  with  such  gloomy  rubbish.  The  Greeks 
had  a  religion  full  of  beauty  and  happiness  and 
light-heartedness,  and  they  were  n't  frightened  of 
death  at  all.  They  made  the  image  of  death  a 
beautiful  boy,  with  a  torch  turned  down.  Their 
greatest  philosophers  openly  preached  and  prac 
tised  the  doctrine  of  suicide  when  one  was  tired 
of  life.  Our  own  early  Church  was  full  of  these 
broad  and  beautiful  Greek  ideas.  You  know  that 
yourself!  And  it  was  only  when  your  miserable 
Jeromes  and  Augustines  and  Cyrils  brought  in  the 
abominable  meannesses  and  cruelties  of  the  Jewish 
Old  Testament,  and  stamped  out  the  sane  and 
lovely  Greek  elements  in  the  Church,  that  Chris 
tians  became  the  poor,  whining,  cowardly  egotists 
they  are,  troubling  about  their  little  tin-pot  souls, 

357 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  scaring  themselves  in  their  churches  by  skulls 
and  crossbones." 

"  My  dear  Celia,"  interposed  the  priest,  patting 
her  shoulder  gently,  "we  will  have  no  Greek 
debate  to-day.  Mr.  Ware  has  been  permitted  to 
taboo  camp- meetings,  and  I  claim  the  privilege  to 
cry  off  on  Greeks.  Look  at  those  fellows  down 
there,  trampling  over  one  another  to  get  more 
beer.  What  have  they  to  do  with  Athens,  or 
Athens  with  them?  I  take  it,  Mr.  Ware,"  he 
went  on,  with  a  grave  face  but  a  twinkling  eye, 
"  that  what  we  are  observing  here  in  front  of  us  is 
symbolical  of  a  great  ethical  and  theological  revo 
lution,  which  in  time  will  modify  and  control  the 
destiny  of  the  entire  American  people.  You  see 
those  young  Irishmen  there,  struggling  like  pigs  at 
a  trough  to  get  their  fill  of  German  beer.  That 
signifies  a  conquest  of  Teuton  over  Kelt  more 
important  and  far-reaching  in  its  results  than  the 
landing  of  Hengist  and  Horsa.  The  Kelt  has 
come  to  grief  heretofore  —  or  at  least  been  forced 
to  play  second  fiddle  to  other  races  —  because  he 
lacked  the  right  sort  of  a  drink.  He  has  in  his 
blood  an  excess  of  impulsive,  imaginative,  even 
fantastic  qualities.  It  is  much  easier  for  him  to 
make  a  fool  of  himself,  to  begin  with,  than  it  is  for 
people  of  slower  wits  and  more  sluggish  tempera 
ments.  When  you  add  whiskey  to  that,  or  that 
essence  of  melancholia  which  in  Ireland  they  call 
'porther,'  you  get  the  Kelt  at  his  very  weakest 

358 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  worst.  These  young  men  down  there  are 
changing  all  that.  They  have  discovered  lager. 
Already  many  of  them  can  outdrink  the  Germans 
at  their  own  beverage.  The  lager- drinking  Irish 
man  in  a  few  generations  will  be  a  new  type  of 
humanity,  —  the  Kelt  at  his  best.  He  will  domi 
nate  America.  He  will  be  the  American.  And 
his  church  —  with  the  Italian  element  thrown 
clean  out  of  it,  and  its  Pope  living,  say,  in  Balti 
more  or  Georgetown  —  will  be  the  Church  of 
America." 

"  Let  us  have  some  more  lager  at  once,"  put  in 
Celia.  "  This  revolution  can't  be  hurried  forward 
too  rapidly." 

Theron  could  not  feel  sure  how  much  of  the 
priest's  discourse  was  in  jest,  how  much  in  earnest. 
"  It  seems  to  me,"  he  said,  "  that  as  things  are 
going,  it  does  n't  look  much  as  if  the  America  of 
the  future  will  trouble  itself  about  any  kind  of  a 
church.  The  march  of  science  must  very  soon 
produce  a  universal  scepticism.  It  is  in  the 
nature  of  human  progress.  What  all  intelligent 
men  recognize  to-day,  the  masses  must  surely 
come  to  see  in  time." 

Father  Forbes  laughed  outright  this  time.  "  My 
dear  Mr.  Ware,"  he  said,  as  they  touched  glasses 
again,  and  sipped  the  fresh  beer  that  had  been 
brought  them,  "  of  all  our  fictions  there  is  none 
so  utterly  baseless  and  empty  as  this  idea  that 
humanity  progresses.  The  savage's  natural  im- 

359 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

pression  is  that  the  world  he  sees  about  him  was 
made  for  him,  and  that  the  rest  of  the  universe  is 
subordinated  to  him  and  his  world,  and  that  all 
the  spirits  and  demons  and  gods  occupy  them 
selves  exclusively  with  him  and  his  affairs.  That 
idea  was  the  basis  of  every  pagan  religion,  and  it 
is  the  basis  of  the  Christian  religion,  simply  be 
cause  it  is  the  foundation  of  human  nature.  That 
foundation  is  just  as  firm  and  unshaken  to-day  as  it 
was  in  the  Stone  Age.  It  will  always  remain,  and 
upon  it  will  always  be  built  some  kind  of  a  reli 
gious  superstructure.  '  Intelligent  men,'  as  you  call 
them,  really  have  very  little  influence,  even  when 
they  all  pull  one  way.  The  people  as  a  whole 
soon  get  tired  of  them.  They  give  too  much 
trouble.  The  most  powerful  forces  in  human 
nature  are  self-protection  and  inertia.  The  mid 
dle-aged  man  has  found  out  that  the  chief  wisdom 
in  life  is  to  bend  to  the  pressures  about  him,  to 
shut  up  and  do  as  others  do.  Even  when  he 
thinks  he  has  rid  his  own  mind  of  superstitions, 
he  sees  that  he  will  best  enjoy  a  peaceful  life  by 
leaving  other  peoples'  superstitions  alone.  That 
is  always  the  ultimate  view  of  the  crowd." 

"  But  I  don't  see,"  observed  Theron,  "  granting 
that  all  this  is  true,  how  you  think  the  Catholic 
Church  will  come  out  on  top.  I  could  under 
stand  it  of  Unitarian! sm,  or  Universalism,  or  the 
Episcopal  Church,  where  nobody  seems  to  have  to 
believe  particularly  in  anything  except  the  beauty 

360 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

of  its  burial  service,  but  I  should  think  the  very 
rigidity  of  the  Catholic  creed  would  make  it  im 
possible.  There  everything  is  hard  and  fast; 
nothing  is  elastic ;  there  is  no  room  for  compro 
mise." 

"  The  Church  is  always  compromising,"  ex 
plained  the  priest,  "  only  it  does  it  so  slowly  that  no 
one  man  lives  long  enough  to  quite  catch  it  at  the 
trick.  No  ;  the  great  secret  of  the  Catholic  Church 
is  that  it  does  n't  debate  with  sceptics.  No  matter 
what  points  you  make  against  it,  it  is  never  be 
trayed  into  answering  back.  It  simply  says  these 
things  are  sacred  mysteries,  which  you  are  quite 
free  to  accept  and  be  saved,  or  reject  and  be 
damned.  There  is  something  intelligible  and  fine 
about  an  attitude  like  that.  When  people  have 
grown  tired  of  their  absurd  and  fruitless  wrangling 
over  texts  and  creeds  which,  humanly  speaking, 
are  all  barbaric  nonsense,  they  will  come  back  to 
repose  pleasantly  under  the  Catholic  roof,  in  that 
restful  house  where  things  are  taken  for  granted. 
There  the  manners  are  charming,  the  service 
excellent,  the  decoration  and  upholstery  most 
acceptable  to  the  eye,  and  the  music  "  —  he  made 
a  little  mock  bow  here  to  Celia  —  "  the  music  at 
least  is  divine.  There  you  have  nothing  to  do 
but  be  agreeable,  and  avoid  scandal,  and  observe 
the  convenances.  You  are  no  more  expected  to 
express  doubts  about  the  Immaculate  Conception 
than  you  are  to  ask  the  lady  whom  you  take  down 

361 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

to  dinner  how  old  she  is.  Now  that  is,  as  I  have 
said,  an  intelligent  and  rational  church  for  people 
to  have.  As  the  Irish  civilize  themselves,  —  you 
observe  them  diligently  engaged  in  the  process 
down  below  there,  —  and  the  social  roughness  of 
their  church  becomes  softened  and  ameliorated, 
Americans  will  inevitably  be  attracted  toward  it. 
In  the  end,  it  will  embrace  them  all,  and  be 
modified  by  them,  and  in  turn  influence  their 
development,  till  you  will  have  a  new  nation 
and  a  new  national  church,  each  representative 
of  the  other." 

"  And  all  this  is  to  be  done  by  lager  beer !  " 
Theron  ventured  to  comment,  jokingly.  He  was 
conscious  of  a  novel  perspiration  around  the  bridge 
of  his  nose,  which  was  obviously  another  effect  of 
the  drink. 

The  priest  passed  the  pleasantry  by.  "  No," 
he  said  seriously ;  "  what  you  must  see  is  that 
there  must  always  be  a  church.  If  one  did  not 
exist,  it  would  be  necessary  to  invent  it.  It  is 
needed,  first  and  foremost,  as  a  police  force.  It 
is  needed,  secondly,  so  to  speak,  as  a  fire  insur 
ance.  It  provides  the  most  even  temperature  and 
pure  atmosphere  for  the  growth  of  young  children. 
It  furnishes  the  best  obtainable  social  machinery 
for  marrying  off  one's  daughters,  getting  to  know 
the  right  people,  patching  up  quarrels,  and  so  on. 
The  priesthood  earn  their  salaries  as  the  agents 
for  these  valuable  social  arrangements.  Their 

362 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

theology  is  thrown  in  as  a  sort  of  intellectual 
diversion,  like  the  ritual  of  a  benevolent  organiza 
tion.  There  are  some  who  get  excited  about  this 
part  of  it,  just  as  one  hears  of  Free-Masons  who 
believe  that  the  sun  rises  and  sets  to  exemplify 
their  ceremonies.  Others  take  their  duties  more 
quietly,  and,  understanding  just  what  it  all  amounts 
to,  make  the  best  of  it,  like  you  and  me." 

Theron  assented  to  the  philosophy  and  the 
compliment  by  a  grave  bow.  "  Yes,  that  is  the 
idea,  —  to  make  the  best  of  it,"  he  said,  and 
fastened  his  regard  boldly  this  time  upon  the 
swings. 

"  We  were  both  ordained  by  our  bishops," 
continued  the  priest,  "  at  an  age  when  those 
worthy  old  gentlemen  would  not  have  trusted  our 
combined  wisdom  to  buy  a  horse  for  them." 

"  And  I  was  married,"  broke  in  Theron,  with 
an  eagerness  almost  vehement,  "  when  I  had  only 
just  been  ordained  !  At  the  worst,  you  had  only 
the  Church  fastened  upon  your  back,  before  you 
were  old  enough  to  know  what  you  wanted.  It  is 
easy  enough  to  make  the  best  of  that ;  but  it  is 
different  with  me." 

A  marked  silence  followed  this  outburst.  The 
Rev.  Mr.  Ware  had  never  spoken  of  his  marriage 
to  either  of  these  friends  before ;  and  something 
in  their  manner  seemed  to  suggest  that  they  did 
not  find  the  subject  inviting,  now  that  it  had  been 
broached.  He  himself  was  filled  with  a  desire  to 

363 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

say  more  about  it.  He  had  never  clearly  realized 
before  what  a  genuine  grievance  it  was.  The 
moisture  at  the  top  of  his  nose  merged  itself  into 
tears  in  the  corners  of  his  eyes,  as  the  cruel  enor 
mity  of  the  sacrifice  he  had  made  in  his  youth  rose 
before  him.  His  whole  life  had  been  fettered  and 
darkened  by  it.  He  turned  his  gaze  from  the 
swings  toward  Celia,  to  claim  the  sympathy  he 
knew  she  would  feel  for  him. 

But  Celia  was  otherwise  engaged.  A  young 
man  had  come  up  to  her,  —  a  tall  and  extremely 
thin  young  man,  soberly  dressed,  and  with  a  long, 
gaunt,  hollow-eyed  face,  the  skin  of  which  seemed 
at  once  florid  and  pale.  He  had  sandy  hair  and 
the  rough  hands  of  a  workman  ;  but  he  was  speak 
ing  to  Miss  Madden  in  the  confidential  tones  of 
an  equal. 

"  I  can  do  nothing  at  all  with  him,"  this  new 
comer  said  to  her.  "  He  '11  not  be  said  by  me. 
Perhaps  he  'd  listen  to  you  !  " 

"  It 's  likely  I  '11  go  down  there  !  "  said  Celia. 
"  He  may  do  what  he  likes  for  all  me  !  Take 
my  advice,  Michael,  and  just  go  your  way,  and 
leave  him  to  himself.  There  was  a  time  when  I 
would  have  taken  out  my  eyes  for  him,  but  it  was 
love  wasted  and  thrown  away.  After  the  warnings 
he  's  had,  if  he  will  bring  trouble  on  himself,  let 
us  make  it  no  affair  of  ours." 

Theron  had  found  himself  exchanging  glances 
of  inquiry  with  this  young  man.  "Mr.  Ware," 

364 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

said  Celia,  here,  "  let  me  introduce  you  to  my 
brother  Michael,  —  my  full  brother." 

Mr.  Ware  remembered  him  now,  and  began, 
in  response  to  the  other's  formal  bow,  to  say  some 
thing  about  their  having  met  in  the  dark,  inside 
the  church.  But  Celia  held  up  her  hand.  "  I  'm 
afraid,  Mr.  Ware,"  she  said  hurriedly,  "  that  you 
are  in  for  a  glimpse  of  the  family  skeleton.  I  will 
apologize  for  the  infliction  in  advance." 

Wonderingly,  Theron  followed  her  -look,  and  saw 
another  young  man  who  had  come  up  the  path 
from  the  crowd  below,  and  was  close  upon  them. 
The  minister  recognized  in  him  a  figure  which  had 
seemed  to  be  the  centre  of  almost  every  group 
about  the  bar  that  he  had  studied  in  detail.  He 
was  a  small,  dapper,  elegantly  attired  youth,  with 
dark  hair,  and  the  handsome,  regularly  carved  face 
of  an  actor.  He  advanced  with  a  smiling  counte 
nance  and  unsteady  step,  —  his  silk  hat  thrust  back 
upon  his  head,  his  frock-coat  and  vest  unbuttoned, 
and  his  neckwear  disarranged,  —  and  saluted  the 
company  with  amiability. 

"I  saw  you  up  here,  Father  Forbes,"  he  said, 
with  a  thickened  and  erratic  utterance.  "  Why  n't 
you  come  down  and  join  us?  I  'm  setting  'em  up 
for  everybody.  You  got  to  take  care  of  the  boys, 
you  know.  I  '11  blow  in  the  last  cent  I  've  got  in 
the  world  for  the  boys,  every  time,  and  they  know 
it.  They  're  solider  for  me  than  they  ever  were 
for  anybody,  That 's  how  it  is.  If  you  stand  by 

365 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  boys,  the  boys  '11  stand  by  you.  I  'm  going 
to  the  Assembly  for  this  district,  and  they  ain't 
nobody  can  stop  me.  The  boys  are  just  red  hot 
for  me.  Wish  you  'd  come  down,  Father  Forbes, 
and  address  a  few  words  to  the  meeting,  —  just 
mention  that  I  'm  a  candidate,  and  say  I  'm  bound 
to  win,  hands  down.  That  '11  make  you  solid  with 
the  boys,  and  we  '11  be  all  good  fellows  together. 
Come  on  down  !  " 

The  priest  affably  disengaged  his  arm  from  the 
clutch  which  the  speaker  had  laid  upon  it,  and 
shook  his  head  in  gentle  deprecation.  "  No,  no  ; 
you  must  excuse  me,  Theodore,"  he  said.  "We 
mustn't  meddle  in  politics,  you  know." 

"  Politics  be  damned  !  "  urged  Theodore,  grab 
bing  the  priest's  other  arm,  and  tugging  at  it 
stoutly  to  pull  him  down  the  path.  "  I  say, 
boys  ! "  he  shouted  to  those  below,  "here  's  Father 
Forbes,  and  he 's  going  to  come  down  and  address 
the  meeting.  Come  on,  Father !  Come  down, 
and  have  a  drink  with  the  boys  !  " 

It  was  Celia  who  sharply  pulled  his  hand  away 
from  the  priest's  arm  this  time.  "Go  away  with 
you  ! "  she  snapped  in  low,  angry  tones  at  the 
intruder.  "You  should  be  ashamed  of  yourself! 
If  you  can't  keep  sober  yourself,  you  can  at  least 
keep  your  hands  off  the  priest.  I  should  think 
you  'd  have  more  decency,  when  you  're  in  such  a 
state  as  this,  than  to  come  where  I  am.  If  you  've 
no  respect  for  yourself,  you  might  have  that  much 
respect  for  me  !  And  before  strangers,  too  !  " 

366 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  Oh,  I  must  n't  come  where  you  are,  eh  ? " 
remarked  the  peccant  Theodore,  straightening 
himself  with  an  elaborate  effort.  "  You  've  bought 
these  woods,  have  you  ?  I  Ve  got  a  hundred 
friends  here,  all  the  same,  for  every  one  you  '11 
ever  have  in  your  life,  Red-head,  and  don't  you 
forget  it." 

"  Go  and  spend  your  money  with  them,  then,  and 
don't  come  insulting  decent  people,"  said  Celia. 

"  Before  strangers,  too  !  "  the  young  man  called 
out,  with  beery  sarcasm.  "  Oh,  we  '11  take  care  of 
the  strangers  all  right."  He  had  not  seemed  to 
be  aware  of  Theron's  presence,  much  less  his 
identity,  before ;  but  he  turned  to  him  now  with  a 
knowing  grin.  "  I  'm  running  for  the  Assembly, 
Mr.  Ware,"  he  said,  speaking  loudly  and  with 
deliberate  effort  to  avoid  the  drunken  elisions  and 
comminglings  to  which  his  speech  tended,  "  and  I 
want  you  to  fix  up  the  Methodists  solid  for  me. 
I  'm  going  to  drive  over  to  the  camp-meeting 
to-night,  me  and  some  of  the  boys  in  a  barouche, 
and  I  '11  put  a  twenty-dollar  bill  on  their  plate. 
Here  it  is  now,  if  you  want  to  see  it." 

As  the  young  man  began  fumbling  in  a 
vest-pocket,  Theron  gathered  his  wits  together. 
"You'd  better  not  go  this  evening,"  he  said,  as 
convincingly  as  he  knew  how ;  "  because  the  gates 
will  be  closed  very  early,  and  the  Saturday- evening 
services  are  of  a  particularly  special  nature,  quite 
reserved  for  those  living  on  the  grounds." 

367 


"Rats  !  "  said  Theodore,  raising  his  head,  and 
abandoning  the  search  for  the  bill.  "  Why  don't 
you  speak  out  like  a  man,  and  say  you  think  I  'in 
too  drunk?  " 

"  I  don't  think  that  is  a  question  which  need 
arise  between  us,  Mr.  Madden.,"  murmured  Theron, 
confusedly. 

"  Oh,  don't  you  make  any  mistake  !  A  hell  of 
a  lot  of  questions  arise  between  us,  Mr.  Ware," 
cried  Theodore,  with  a  sudden  accession  of  vigor 
in  tone  and  mien.  "And  one  of  'em  is — go  away 
from  me,  Michael !  —  one  of  'em  is,  I  say,  why 
don't  you  leave  our  girls  alone  ?  They  Ve  got 
their  own  priests  to  make  fools  of  themselves  over, 
without  any  sneak  of  a  Protestant  parson  coming 
meddling  round  them.  You  're  a  married  man 
into  the  bargain ;  and  you  Ve  got  in  your  house 
this  minute  a  piano  that  my  sister  bought  and  paid 
for.  Oh,  I  Ve  seen  the  entry  in  Thurston's  books  ! 
You  have  the  cheek  to  talk  to  me  about  being 
drunk  —  why  —  " 

These  remarks  were  never  concluded,  for  Father 
Forbes  here  clapped  a  hand  abruptly  over  the 
offending  mouth,  and  flung  his  free  arm  in  a  tight 
grip  around  the  young  man's  waist.  "Come  with 
me,  Michael !  "  he  said,  and  the  two  men  led  the 
reluctant  and  resisting  Theodore  at  a  sharp  pace 
off  into  the  woods. 

Theron  and  Celia  stood  and  watched  them  dis 
appear  among  the  undergrowth.  "  It 's  the  dirty 

368 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Foley  blood  that's  in  him,"  he  heard  her  say,  as 
if  between  clenched  teeth. 

The  girl's  big  brown  eyes,  when  Theron  looked 
into  them  again,  were  still  fixed  upon  the  screen 
of  foliage,  and  dilated  like  those  of  a  Medusa 
mask.  The  blood  had  gone  away,  and  left  the 
fair  face  and  neck  as  white,  it  seemed  to  him,  as 
marble.  Even  her  lips,  fiercely  bitten  together, 
appeared  colorless.  The  picture  of  consuming 
and  powerless  rage  which  she  presented,  and  the 
shuddering  tremor  which  ran  over  her  form,  as 
visible  as  the  quivering  track  of  a  gust  of  wind 
across  a  pond,  awed  and  frightened  him. 

Tenderness  toward  her  helpless  state  came  too, 
and  uppermost.  He  drew  her  arm  into  his,  and 
turned  their  backs  upon  the  picnic  scene. 

"  Let  us  walk  a  little  up  the  path  into  the 
woods,"  he  said,  "  and  get  away  from  all  this." 

"The  further  away  the  better,"  she  answered 
bitterly,  and  he  felt  the  shiver  run  through  her 
again  as  she  spoke. 

The  methodical  waltz-music  from  that  unseen 
dancing  platform  rose  again  above  all  other  sounds. 
They  moved  up  the  woodland  path,  their  steps  in 
sensibly  falling  into  the  rhythm  of  its  strains,  and 
vanished  from  sight  among  the  trees. 


369 


CHAPTER   XXIV 

THERON  and  Celia  walked  in  silence  for  some 
minutes,  until  the  noises  of  the  throng  they  had 
left  behind  were  lost.  The  path  they  followed 
had  grown  indefinite  among  the  grass  and  creepers 
of  the  forest  carpet ;  now  it  seemed  to  end  alto 
gether  in  a  little  copse  of  young  birches,  the  deli 
cately  graceful  stems  of  which  were  clustered  about 
a  parent  stump,  long  since  decayed  and  overgrown 
with  lichens  and  layers  of  thick  moss. 

As  the  two  paused,  the  girl  suddenly  sank  upon 
her  knees,  then  threw  herself  face  forward  upon 
the  soft  green  bank  which  had  formed  itself  above 
the  roots  of  the  ancient  mother-tree.  Her  com 
panion  looked  down  in  pained  amazement  at  what 
he  saw.  Her  body  shook  with  the  violence  of 
recurring  sobs,  or  rather  gasps  of  wrath  and  grief. 
Her  hands,  with  stiffened,  claw-like  fingers,  dug 
into  the  moss  and  tangle  of  tiny  vines,  and  tore 
them  by  the  roots.  The  half-stifled  sounds  of 
weeping  that  arose  from  where  her  face  grovelled 
in  the  leaves  were  terrible  to  his  ears.  He  knew 
not  what  to  say  or  do,  but  gazed  in  resourceless 
suspense  at  the  strange  figure  she  made.  It 

370 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

seemed  a  cruelly  long  time  that  she  lay  there, 
almost  at  his  feet,  struggling  fiercely  with  the 
fury  that  was  in  her. 

All  at  once  the  paroxysms  passed  away,  the 
sounds  of  wild  weeping  ceased.  Celia  sat  up,  and 
with  her  handkerchief  wiped  the  tears  and  leafy 
fragments  from  her  face.  She  rearranged  her  hat 
and  the  braids  of  her  hair  with  swift,  instinctive 
touches,  brushed  the  woodland  debris  from  her 
front,  and  sprang  to  her  feet. 

'•'  I  'm  all  right  now,"  she  said  briskly.  There 
was  palpable  effort  in  her  light  tone,  and  in  the 
stormy  sort  of  smile  which  she  forced  upon  her 
blotched  and  perturbed  countenance,  but  they 
were  only  too  welcome  to  Theron's  anxious  mood. 

"  Thank  God  !  "  he  blurted  out,  all  radiant  with 
relief.  "  I  feared  you  were  going  to  have  a  fit  — 
or  something." 

Celia  laughed,  a  little  artificially  at  first,  then 
with  a  genuine  surrender  to  the  comic  side  of  his 
visible  fright.  The  mirth  came  back  into  the 
brown  depths  of  her  eyes  again,  and  her  face 
cleared  itself  of  tear-stains  and  the  marks  of  agi 
tation.  "  I  am  a  nice  quiet  party  for  a  Methodist 
minister  to  go  walking  in  the  woods  with,  am  I 
not?"  she  cried,  shaking  her  skirts  and  smiling 
at  him. 

"  I  am  not  a  Methodist  minister  —  please  !  " 
answered  Theron,  —  "at  least  not  to-day,  —  and 
here  —  with  you  !  I  am  just  a  man,  —  nothing 

371 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

more,  —  a  man  who  has  escaped  from  lifelong 
imprisonment,  and  feels  for  the  first  time  what  it 
is  to  be  free  !  " 

"  Ah,  my  friend,"  Celia  said,  shaking  her  head 
slowly,  "  I  'm  afraid  you  deceive  yourself.  You 
are  not  by  any  means  free.  You  are  only  look 
ing  out  of  the  window  of  your  prison,  as  you  call 
it.  The  doors  are  locked,  just  the  same." 

"  I  will  smash  them  ! "  he  declared,  with  con 
fidence.  "Or  for  that  matter,  I  have  smashed 
them,  —  battered  them  to  pieces.  You  don't  re 
alize  what  progress  I  have  made,  what  changes 
there  have  been  in  me  since  that  night,  —  you 
remember  that  wonderful  night !  I  am  quite 
another  being,  I  assure  you  !  And  really  it  dates 
from  way  beyond  that,  —  why,  from  the  very  first 
evening,  when  I  came  to  you  in  the  church.  The 
window  in  Father  Forbes'  room  was  open,  and  I 
stood  by  it  listening  to  the  music  next  door,  and 
I  could  just  faintly  see  on  the  dark  window  across 
the  alley- way  a  stained-glass  picture  of  a  woman. 
I  suppose  it  was  the  Virgin  Mary.  She  had  hair 
like  yours,  and  your  face,  too ;  and  that  is  why  I 
went  into  the  church  and  found  you.  Yes,  that 
is  why." 

Celia  regarded  him  with  gravity.  "  You  will 
.get  yourself  into  great  trouble,  my  friend,"  she  said. 

"  That  's  where  you  're  wrong,"  put  in  Theron. 
"  Not  that  I  'd  mind  any  trouble  in  this  wide 
world,  so  long  as  you  called  me  '  my  friend,'  but 

372 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

I  'm  not  going  to  get  into  any  at  all.  I  know  a 
trick  worth  two  of  that.  I  've  learned  to  be  a 
showman.  I  can  preach  now  far  better  than  I 
used  to,  and  I  can  get  through  my  work  in  half 
the  time,  and  keep  on  the  right  side  of  my  people, 
and  get  along  with  perfect  smoothness.  I  was  too 
green  before.  I  took  the  thing  seriously,  and  I 
let  every  mean-fisted  curmudgeon  and  crazy  fan 
atic  worry  me,  and  keep  me  on  pins  and  needles. 
I  don't  do  that  any  more.  I  Ve  taken  a  new 
measure  of  life.  I  see  now  what  life  is  really 
worth,  and  I  'm  going  to  have  my  share  of  it. 
Why  should  I  deliberately  deny  myself  all  possible 
happiness  for  the  rest  of  my  days,  simply  because 
I  made  a  fool  of  myself  when  I  was  in  my  teens  ? 
Other  men  are  not  eternally  punished  like  that, 
for  what  they  did  as  boys,  and  I  won't  submit  to 
it  either.  I  will  be  as  free  to  enjoy  myself  as  — 
as  Father  Forbes." 

Celia  smiled  softly,  and  shook  her  head  again. 
"  Poor  man,  to  call  him  free  !  "  she  said  :  "why, 
he  is  bound  hand  and  foot.  You  don't  in  the 
least  realize  how  he  is  hedged  about,  the  work  he 
has  to  do,  the  thousand  suspicious  eyes  that  watch 
his  every  movement,  eager  to  bring  the  Bishop 
down  upon  him.  And  then  think  of  his  sacrifice, 
—  the  great  sacrifice  of  all,  —  to  never  know  what 
love  means,  to  forswear  his  manhood,  to  live  a 
forlorn,  celibate  life  —  you  have  no  idea  how  sadly 
that  appeals  to  a  woman." 

373 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  Let  us  sit  down  here  fora  little,"  said  Theron  ; 
"  we  seem  at  the  end  of  the  path."  She  seated 
herself  on  the  root-based  mound,  and  he  reclined 
at  her  side,  with  an  arm  carelessly  extended 
behind  her  on  the  moss. 

"  I  can  see  what  you  mean,"  he  went  on,  after 
a  pause.  "  But  to  me,  do  you  know,  there  is  an 
enormous  fascination  in  celibacy.  You  forget  that 
I  know  the  reverse  of  the  medal.  I  know  how  the 
mind  can  be  cramped,  the  nerves  harassed,  the 
ambitions  spoiled  and  rotted,  the  whole  existence 
darkened  and  belittled,  by  —  by  the  other  thing.  I 
have  never  talked  to  you  before  about  my  marriage." 

"  I  don't  think  we  'd  better  talk  about  it  now," 
observed  Celia.  "There  must  be  many  more 
amusing  topics." 

He  missed  the  spirit  of  her  remark.  "  You  are 
right,"  he  said  slowly.  "  It  is  too  sad  a  thing  to 
talk  about.  But  there  !  it  is  my  lead,  and  I  bear 
it,  and  there  's  nothing  more  to  be  said." 

Theron  drew  a  heavy  sigh,  and  let  his  fingers 
toy  abstractedly  with  a  ribbon  on  the  outer  edge 
of  Celia's  penumbra  of  apparel. 

"  No,"  she  said.  "  We  must  n't  snivel,  and  we 
must  n't  sulk.  When  I  get  into  a  rage  it  makes 
me  ill,  and  I  storm  my  way  through  it  and  tear 
things,  but  it  does  n't  last  long,  and  I  come  out  of 
it  feeling  all  the  better.  I  don't  know  that  I  Ve 
ever  seen  your  wife.  I  suppose  she  has  n't  got  red 
hair?" 

374 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  I  think  it  's  a  kind  of  light  brown,"  answered 
Theron,  with  an  effect  of  exerting  his  memory. 

"  It  seems  that  you  only  take  notice  of  hair  in 
stained-glass  windows,"  was  Celia's  comment. 

"  Oh-h  !  "  he  murmured  reproachfully,  "  as 
if  —  as  if —  but  I  won't  say  what  I  was  going  to." 

"That 's  not  fair  !  "  she  said.  The  little  touch 
of  whimsical  mockery  which  she  gave  to  the 
serious  declaration  was  delicious  to  him.  "You 
have  me  at  such  a  disadvantage  !  Here  am  I  rat 
tling  out  whatever  comes  into  my  head,  exposing 
all  my  lightest  emotions,  and  laying  bare  my  very 
heart  in  candor,  and  you  meditate,  you  turn  things 
over  cautiously  in  your  mind,  like  a  second  Machia- 
velli.  I  grow  afraid  of  you ;  you  are  so  subtle 
and  mysterious  in  your  reserves." 

Theron  gave  a  tug  at  the  ribbon,  to  show  the 
joy  he  had  in  her  delicate  chaff.  "«No,  it  is  you 
who  are  secretive,"  he  said.  "  You  never  told  me 
about  —  about  the  piano." 

The  word  was  out !  A  minute  before  it  had 
seemed  incredible  to  him  that  he  should  ever  have 
the  courage  to  utter  it  —  but  here  it  was.  He 
laid  firm  hold  upon  the  ribbon,  which  it  appeared 
hung  from  her  waist,  and  drew  himself  a  trifle 
nearer  to  her.  "  I  could  never  have  consented  to 
take  it,  I  'm  afraid,"  he  went  on  in  a  low  voice, 
"  if  I  had  known.  And  even  as  it  is,  I  fear  it 
won't  be  possible." 

"What  are  you  afraid  of?"  asked  Celia.    "Why 

375 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

should  n't  you  take  it  ?  People  in  your  profession 
never  do  get  anything  unless  it  's  given  to  them, 
do  they?  I  Ve  always  understood  it  was  like  that. 
I  Ve  often  read  of  donation  parties  —  that 's  what 
they  're  called,  is  n't  it  ?  —  where  everybody  is 
supposed  to  bring  some  gift  to  the  minister. 
Very  well,  then,  I  Ve  simply  had  a  donation  party 
of  my  own,  that 's  all.  Unless  you  mean  that  my 
being  a  Catholic  makes  a  difference.  I  had 
supposed  you  were  quite  free  from  that  kind  of 
prejudice." 

"  So  I  am  !  Believe  me,  I  am  !  "  urged  Theron. 
"  When  I  'm  with  you,  it  seems  impossible  to 
realize  that  there  are  people  so  narrow  and  con 
tracted  in  their  natures  as  to  take  account  of  such 
things.  It  is  another  atmosphere  that  I  breathe 
near  you.  How  could  you  imagine  that  such  a 
thought — about  our  difference  of  creed — would 
enter  my  head?  In  fact,"  he  concluded  with  a 
nervous  half-laugh,  "  there  is  n't  any  such  differ 
ence.  Whatever  your  religion  is,  it 's  mine  too. 
You  remember  —  you  adopted  me  as  a  Greek." 

"Did  I?"  she  rejoined.  "Well,  if  that's  the 
case,  it  leaves  you  without  a  leg  to  stand  on.  I 
challenge  you  to  find  any  instance  where  a  Greek 
made  any  difficulties  about  accepting  a  piano 
from  a  friend.  But  seriously  —  while  we  are  talk 
ing  about  it  —  you  introduced  the  subject :  I 
did  n't  —  I  might  as  well  explain  to  you  that  I 
had  no  such  intention,  when  I  picked  the  instni- 

376 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ment  out.  It  was  later,  when  I  was  talking  to 
Thurston's  people  about  the  price,  that  the  whim 
seized  me.  Now  it  is  the  one  fixed  rule  of  my 
life  to  obey  my  whims.  Whatever  occurs  to  me 
as  a  possibly  pleasant  thing  to  do,  straight  like  a 
flash,  I  go  and  do  it.  It  is  the  only  way  that  a 
person  with  means,  with  plenty  of  money,  can 
preserve  any  freshness  of  character.  If  they  stop 
to  think  what  it  would  be  prudent  to  do,  they  get 
crusted  over  immediately.  That  is  the  curse  of 
rich  people,  —  they  teach  themselves  to  distrust 
and  restrain  every  impulse  toward  unusual  actions. 
They  get  to  feel  that  it  is  more  necessary  for 
them  to  be  cautious  and  conventional  than  it  is 
for  others.  I  would  rather  work  at  a  wash-tub 
than  occupy  that  attitude  toward  my  bank  account. 
I  fight  against  any  sign  of  it  that  I  detect  rising 
in  my  mind.  The  instant  a  wish  occurs  to  me,  I 
rush  to  gratify  it.  That  is  my  theory  of  life. 
That  accounts  for  the  piano ;  and  I  don't  see  that 
you've  anything  to  say  about  it  at  all." 

It  seemed  very  convincing,  this  theory  of  life. 
Somehow,  the  thought  of  Miss  Madden's  riches 
had  never  before  assumed  prominence  in  Theron's 
mind.  Of  course  her  father  was  very  wealthy,  but 
it  had  not  occurred  to  him  that  the  daughter's 
emancipation  might  run  to  the  length  of  a  personal 
fortune.  He  knew  so  little  of  rich  people  and 
their  ways  ! 

He   lifted   his   head,  and  looked  up  at  Celia 
377 


with  an  awakened  humility  and  awe  in  his  glance. 
The  glamour  of  a  separate  banking-account  shone 
upon  her.  Where  the  soft  woodland  light  played 
in  among  the  strands  of  her  disordered  hair,  he 
saw  the  veritable  gleam  of  gold.  A  mysterious 
new  suggestion  of  power  blended  itself  with  the 
beauty  of  her  face,  was  exhaled  in  the  faint  per 
fume  of  her  garments.  He  maintained  a  timorous 
hold  upon  the  ribbon,  wondering  at  his  hardihood 
in  touching  it,  or  being  near  her  at  all. 

"  What  surprises  me,"  he  heard  himself  saying, 
"  is  that  you  are  contented  to  stay  in  Octavius. 
I  should  think  that  you  would  travel  —  go  abroad 
—  see  the  beautiful  things  of  the  world,  surround 
yourself  with  the  luxuries  of  big  cities,  —  and  that 
sort  of  thing." 

Celia  regarded  the  forest  prospect  straight  in 
front  of  her  with  a  pensive  gaze.  "  Sometime  — 
no  doubt  I  will  sometime,"  she  said  abstractedly. 

"  One  reads  so  much  nowadays,"  he  went  on, 
"  of  American  heiresses  going  to  Europe  and 
marrying  dukes  and  noblemen.  I  suppose  you 
will  do  that  too.  Princes  would  fight  one  another 
foi  you" 

The  least  touch  of  a  smile  softened  for  an 
instant  the  impassivity  of  her  countenance.  Then 
she  stared  harder  than  ever  at  the  vague,  leafy 
distance.  "That  is  the  old-fashioned  idea,"  she 
said,  in  a  musing  tone,  "  that  women  must  belong 
to  somebody,  as  if  they  were  curios,  or  statues,  or 

378 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

race- horses.  You  don't  understand,  my  friend, 
that  I  have  a  different  view.  I  am  myself,  and  I 
belong  to  myself,  exactly  as  much  as  any  man. 
The  notion  that  any  other  human  being  could 
conceivably  obtain  the  slightest  property  rights  in 
me  is  as  preposterous,  as  ridiculous,  as  —  what 
shall  I  say?  —  as  the  notion  of  your  being  taken 
out  with  a  chain  on  your  neck  and  sold  by  auction 
as  a  slave,  down  on  the  canal  bridge.  I  should 
be  ashamed  to  be  alive  for  another  day,  if  any 
other  thought  were  possible  to  me." 

"  That  is  not  the  generally  accepted  view,  I 
should  think,"  faltered  Theron. 

"  No  more  is  it  the  accepted  view  that  young 
married  Methodist  ministers  should  sit  out  alone 
in  the  woods  with  red-headed  Irish  girls.  No, 
my  friend,  let  us  find  what  the  generally  accepted 
views  are,  and  as  fast  as  we  find  them  set  our 
heels  on  them.  There  is  no  other  way  to  live 
like  real  human  beings.  What  on  earth  is  it  to 
me  that  other  women  crawl  about  on  all- fours, 
and  fawn  like  dogs  on  any  hand  that  will  buckle 
a  collar  onto  them,  and  toss  them  the  leavings 
of  the  table  ?  I  am  not  related  to  them.  I  have 
nothing  to  do  with  them.  They  cannot  make  any 
rules  for  me.  If  pride  and  dignity  and  independ 
ence  are  dead  in  them,  why,  so  much  the  worse 
for  them  !  It  is  no  affair  of  mine.  Certainly  it  is 
no  reason  why  I  should  get  down  and  grovel  also. 
No ;  I  at  least  stand  erect  on  my  legs." 

379 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Mr.  Ware  sat  up,  and  stared  confusedly,  with 
round  eyes  and  parted  lips,  at  his  companion. 
Instinctively  his  brain  dragged  forth  to  the  surface 
those  epithets  which  the  doctor  had  hurled  in 
bitter  contempt  at  her,  —  "  mad  ass,  a  mere  bundle 
of  egotism,  ignorance,  and  red-headed  lewdness." 
The  words  rose  in  their  order  on  his  memory, 
hard  and  sharp-edged,  like  arrow-heads.  But  to 
sit  there,  quite  at  her  side ;  to  breathe  the  same 
air,  and  behold  the  calm  loveliness  of  her  profile  ; 
to  touch  the  ribbon  of  her  dress,  —  and  all  the 
while  to  hold  these  poisoned  darts  of  abuse  levelled 
in  thought  at  her  breast,  —  it  was  monstrous.  He 
could  have  killed  the  doctor  at  that  moment. 
With  an  effort,  he  drove  the  foul  things  from  his 
mind,  —  scattered  them  back  into  the  darkness. 
He  felt  that  he  had  grown  pale,  and  wondered 
if  she  had  heard  the  groan  that  seemed  to  have 
been  forced  from  him  in  the  struggle.  Or  was 
the  groan  imaginary  ? 

Celia  continued  to  sit  unmoved,  composedly 
looking  upon  vacancy.  Theron's  eyes  searched  her 
face  in  vain  for  any  sign  of  consciousness  that  she 
had  astounded  and  bewildered  him.  She  did  not 
seem  to  be  thinking  of  him  at  all.  The  proud  calm 
of  her  thoughtful  countenance  suggested  instead 
occupation  with  lofty  and  remote  abstractions  and 
noble  ideals.  Contemplating  her,  he  suddenly 
perceived  that  what  she  had  been  saying  was  great, 
wonderful,  magnificent.  An  involuntary  thrill  ran 

380 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

through  his  veins  at  recollection  of  her  words. 
His  fancy  likened  it  to  the  sensation  he  used  to 
feel  as  a  youth,  when  the  Fourth  of  July  reader 
bawled  forth  that  opening  clause  :  "  When,  in  the 
course  of  human  events,  it  becomes  necessary,"  etc. 
It  was  nothing  less  than  another  Declaration  of 
Independence  he  had  been  listening  to. 

He  sank  again  recumbent  at  her  side,  and 
stretched  the  arm  behind  her,  nearer  than  before. 
'•Apparently,  then,  you  will  never  marry."  His 
voice  trembled  a  little. 

"  Most  certainly  not !  "  said  Celia. 

"You  spoke  so  feelingly  a  little  while  ago,"  he 
ventured  along,  with  hesitation,  "  about  how  sadly 
the  notion  of  a  priest's  sacrificing  himself — never 
knowing  what  love  meant  —  appealed  to  a  woman. 
I  should  think  that  the  idea  of  sacrificing  herself 
would  seem  to  her  even  sadder  still." 

"I  don't  remember  that  we  mentioned  that" 
she  replied.  "  How  do  you  mean,  —  sacrificing 
herself?  " 

Theron  gathered  some  of  the  outlying  folds  of 
her  dress  in  his  hand,  and  boldly  patted  and 
caressed  them.  "You,  so  beautiful  and  so  free, 
with  such  fine  talents  and  abilities,"  he  murmured  ; 
"you,  who  could  have  the  whole  world  at  your 
feet,  —  are  you,  too,  never  going  to  know  what 
love  means?  Do  you  call  that  no  sacrifice?  To 
me  it  is  the  most  terrible  that  my  imagination  can 
conceive." 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Celia  laughed,  —  a  gentle,  amused  little  laugh,  in 
which  Theron's  ears  traced  elements  of  tenderness. 
"You  must  regulate  that  imagination  of  yours," 
she  said  playfully.  "  It  conceives  the  thing  that  is 
not.  Pray,  when"  —  and  here,  turning  her  head, 
she  bent  down  upon  his  face  a  gaze  of  arch 
mock-seriousness  —  "  pray,  when  did  I  describe 
myself  in  these  terms?  When  did  I  say  that  I 
should  never  know  what  love  meant?" 

For  answer  Theron  laid  his  head  down  upon  his 
arm,  and  closed  his  eyes,  and  held  his  face  against 
the  draperies  encircling  her.  "  I  cannot  think  !  " 
he  groaned. 

The  thing  that  came  uppermost  in  his  mind,  as 
it  swayed  and  rocked  in  the  tempest  of  emotion, 
was  the  strange  reminiscence  of  early  childhood  in 
it  all.  It  was  like  being  a  little  boy  again,  nestling 
in  an  innocent,  unthinking  transport  of  affection 
against  his  mother's  skirts.  The  tears  he  felt  scald 
ing  his  eyes  were  the  spontaneous,  unashamed 
tears  of  a  child ;  the  tremulous  and  exquisite 
joy  which  spread,  wave-like,  over  him,  at  once 
reposeful  and  yearning,  was  full  of  infantile  purity 
and  sweetness.  He  had  not  comprehended  at  all 
before  what  wellsprings  of  spiritual  beauty,  what 
limpid  depths  of  idealism,  his  nature  contained. 

"We  were  speaking  of  our  respective  religions," 
he  heard  Celia  say,  as  imperturbably  as  if  there 
had  been  no  digression  worth  mentioning. 

"Yes,"  he  assented,  and  moved  his  head  so  that 
382 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

he  looked  up  at  her  back  hair,  and  the  leaves  high 
above,  mottled  against  the  sky.  The  wish  to  lie 
there,  where  now  he  could  just  catch  the  rose-leaf 
line  of  her  under-chin  as  well,  was  very  strong  upon 
him.  "Yes?"  he  repeated. 

"  I  cannot  talk  to  you  like  that,"  she  said ; 
and  he  sat  up  again  shamefacedly. 

"  Yes  —  I  think  we  were  speaking  of  religions  — 
some  time  ago,"  he  faltered,  to  relieve  the  situa 
tion.  The  dreadful  thought  that  she  might  be 
annoyed  began  to  oppress  him. 

"  Well,  you  said  whatever  my  religion  was,  it  was 
yours  too.  That  entitles  you  at  least  to  be  told 
what  the  religion  is.  Now,  I  am  a  Catholic." 

Theron,  much  mystified,  nodded  his  head.  Could 
it  be  possible,  —  was  there  coming  a  deliberate 
suggestion  that  he  should  become  a  convert? 
"Yes  —  I  know,"  he  murmured. 

"But  I  should  explain  that  I  am  only  a  Catholic 
in  the  sense  that  its  symbolism  is  pleasant  to  me. 
You  remember  what  Schopenhauer  said,  —  you 
cannot  have  the  water  by  itself:  you  must  also 
have  the  jug  that  it  is  in.  Very  well ;  the  Catholic 
religion  is  my  jug.  I  put  into  it  the  things  I  like. 
They  were  all  there  long  ago,  thousands  of  years 
ago.  The  Jews  threw  them  out ;  we  will  put  them 
back  again.  We  will  restore  art  and  poetry  and 
the  love  of  beauty,  and  the  gentle,  spiritual,  soulful 
life.  The  Greeks  had  it ;  and  Christianity  would 
have  had  it  too,  if  it  had  n't  been  for  those  brutes 

383 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

they  call  the  Fathers.  They  loved  ugliness  and 
dirt  and  the  thought  of  hell-fire.  They  hated 
women.  In  all  the  earlier  stages  of  the  Church, 
women  were  very  prominent  in  it.  Jesus  himself 
appreciated  women,  and  delighted  to  have  them 
about  him,  and  talk  with  them  and  listen  to  them. 
That  was  the  very  essence  of  the  Greek  spirit ; 
and  it  breathed  into  Christianity  at  its  birth  a 
sweetness  and  a  grace  which  twenty  generations 
of  cranks  and  savages  like  Paul  and  Jerome  and 
Tertullian  weren't  able  to  extinguish.  But  the 
very  man,  Cyril,  who  killed  Hypatia,  and  thus 
began  the  dark  ages,  unwittingly  did  another  thing 
which  makes  one  almost  forgive  him.  To  please 
the  Egyptians,  he  secured  the  Church's  acceptance 
of  the  adoration  of  the  Virgin.  It  is  that  idea 
which  has  kept  the  Greek  spirit  alive,  and  grown 
and  grown,  till  at  last  it  will  rule  the  world.  It 
was  only  epileptic  Jews  who  could  imagine  a 
religion  without  sex  in  it." 

"  I  remember  the  pictures  of  the  Virgin  in  your 
room,"  said  Theron,  feeling  more  himself  again. 
"  I  wondered  if  they  quite  went  with  the  statues." 

The  remark  won  a  smile  from  Celia's  lips. 

"  They  get  along  together  better  than  you  sup 
pose,"  she  answered.  "  Besides,  they  are  not  all 
pictures  of  Mary.  One  of  them,  standing  on  the 
moon,  is  of  Isis  with  the  infant  Horus  in  her  arms. 
Another  might  as  well  be  Mahamie,  bearing  the 
miraculously  born  Buddha,  or  Olympias  with  her 

3*4 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

child  Alexander,  or  even  Perictione  holding  her 
babe  Plato,  —  all  these  were  similar  cases,  you 
know.  Almost  every  religion  had  its  Immaculate 
Conception.  What  does  it  all  come  to,  except  to 
show  us  that  man  turns  naturally  toward  the  worship 
of  the  maternal  idea?  That  is  the  deepest  of  all 
our  instincts,  —  love  of  woman,  who  is  at  once 
daughter  and  wife  and  mother.  It  is  that  that 
makes  the  world  go  round." 

Brave  thoughts  shaped  themselves  in  Theron's 
mind,  and  shone  forth  in  a  confident  yet  wistful 
smile  on  his  face. 

"  It  is  a  pity  you  cannot  change  estates  with  me 
for  one  minute,"  he  said,  in  steady,  low  tones. 
"Then  you  would  realize  the  tremendous  truth  of 
what  you  have  been  saying.  It  is  only  your  intel 
lect  that  has  reached  out  and  grasped  the  idea. 
If  you  were  in  my  place,  you  would  discover  that 
your  heart  was  bursting  with  it  as  well." 

Celia  turned  and  looked  at  him. 

"  I  myself,"  he  went  on,  "  would  not  have  known, 
half  an  hour  ago,  what  you  meant  by  the  worship 
of  the  maternal  idea.  I  am  much  older  than  you. 
I  am  a  strong,  mature  man.  But  when  I  lay  down 
there,  and  shut  my  eyes,  —  because  the  charm  and 
marvel  of  this  whole  experience  had  for  the  mo 
ment  overcome  me,  —  the  strangest  sensation 
seized  upon  me.  It  was  absolutely  as  if  I  were  a 
boy  again,  a  good,  pure-minded,  fond  little  child, 
and  you  were  the  mother  that  I  idolized." 
25  385 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Celia  had  not  taken  her  eyes  from  his  face.  "  I 
find  myself  liking  you  better  at  this  moment,"  she 
said,  with  gravity,  "  than  I  have  ever  liked  you 
before." 

Then,  as  by  a  sudden  impulse,  she  sprang  to  her 
feet.  "  Come  !  "  she  cried,  her  voice  and  manner 
all  vivacity  once  more,  "  we  have  been  here  long 
enough." 

Upon  the  instant,  as  Theron  was  more  labori 
ously  getting  up,  it  became  apparent  to  them  both 
that  perhaps  they  had  been  there  too  long. 

A  boy  with  a  gun  under  his  arm,  and  two  gray 
squirrels  tied  by  the  tails  slung  across  his  shoulder, 
stood  at  the  entrance  to  the  glade,  some  dozen 
paces  away,  regarding  them  with  undisguised  inter 
est.  Upon  the  discovery  that  he  was  in  turn  ob 
served,  he  resumed  his  interrupted  progress  through 
the  woods,  whistling  softly  as  he  went,  and  van 
ished  among  the  trees. 

"  Heavens  above  !  "  groaned  Theron,  shudder- 
ingly. 

"Know  him?"  he  went  on,  in  answer  to  the 
glance  of  inquiry  on  his  companion's  face.  "  I 
should  think  I  did  !  He  spades  my  —  my  wife's 
garden  for  her.  He  used  to  bring  our  milk.  He 
works  in  the  law  office  of  one  of  my  trustees,  —  the 
one  who  is  n't  friendly  to  me,  but  is  very  friendly 
indeed  with  my  —  with  Mrs.  Ware.  Oh,  what 
shall  I  do?  It  may  easily  mean  my  ruin  !  " 

Celia  looked  at  him  attentively.     The  color  had 

386 


gone  out  of  his  face,  and  with  it  the  effect  of  earn 
estness  and  mental  elevation  which,  a  minute  be 
fore,  had  caught  her  fancy.  "  Somehow,  I  fear 
that  I  do  not  like  you  quite  so  much  just  now,  my 
friend,"  she  remarked. 

"  In  God's  name,  don't  say  that !  "  urged  The- 
ron.  He  raised  his  voice  in  agitated  entreaty. 
"You  don't  know  what  these  people  are,  —  how  they 
would  leap  at  the  barest  hint  of  a  scandal  about 
me.  In  my  position  I  am  a  thousand  times  more 
defenceless  than  any  woman.  Just  a  single  whis 
per,  and  I  am  done  for  !  " 

"  Let  me  point  out  to  you,  Mr.  Ware,"  said 
Celia,  slowly,  "  that  to  be  seen  sitting  and  talking 
with  me,  whatever  doubts  it  may  raise  as  to  a  gen 
tleman's  intellectual  condition,  need  not  necessa 
rily  blast  his  social  reputation  beyond  all  hope 
whatever." 

Theron  stared  at  her,  as  if  he  had  not  grasped 
her  meaning.  Then  he  winced  visibly  under  it, 
and  put  out  his  hands  to  implore  her.  "  Forgive 
me  !  Forgive  me  !  "  he  pleaded.  "  I  was  beside 
myself  for  the  moment  with  the  fright  of  the  thing. 
Oh,  say  you  do  forgive  me,  Celia  !  "  He  made 
haste  to  support  this  daring  use  of  her  name.  "  I 
have  been  so  happy  to-day  —  so  deeply,  so  vastly 
happy — like  the  little  child  I  spoke  of — and 
that  is  so  new  in  my  lonely  life  —  that  —  the  sud 
denness  of  the  thing  —  it  just  for  the  instant  un 
strung  me.  Don't  be  too  hard  on  me  for  it ! 

387 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

And  I  had  hoped,  too,  —  I  had  had  such  genuine 
heartfelt  pleasure  in  the  thought,  —  that,  an  hour 
or  two  ago,  whenj^z*  were  unhappy,  perhaps  it 
had  been  some  sort  of  consolation  to  you  that  I 
was  with  you." 

Celia  was  looking  away.  When  he  took  her 
hand  she  did  not  withdraw  it,  but  turned  and  nod 
ded  in  musing  general  assent  to  what  he  had  said. 
"  Yes,  we  have  both  been  unstrung,  as  you  call  it, 
to-day,"  she  said,  "  decidedly  out  of  pitch.  Let 
each  forgive  the  other,  and  say  no  more  about  it." 

She  took  his  arm,  and  they  retraced  their  steps 
along  the  path,  again  in  silence.  The  labored 
noise  of  the  orchestra,  as  it  were,  returned  to  meet 
them.  They  halted  at  an  intersecting  footpath. 

"  I  go  back  to  my  slavery,  —  my  double  bond 
age,"  said  Theron,  letting  his  voice  sink  to  a  sigh. 
"  But  even  if  I  am  put  on  the  rack  for  it,  I  shall 
have  had  one  day  of  glory." 

"  I  think  you  may  kiss  me,  in  memory  of  that 
one  day  —  or  of  a  few  minutes  in  that  day,"  said 
Celia. 

Their  lips  brushed  each  other  in  a  swift,  almost 
perfunctory  caress. 

Theron  went  his  way  at  a  hurried  pace,  the 
sobered  tones  of  her  "good-bye"  beating  upon 
his  brain  with  every  measure  of  the  droning  waltz- 
music. 


388 


PART    IV 


CHAPTER  XXV 

THE  memory  of  the  kiss  abode  with  Theron. 
Like  Aaron's  rod,  it  swallowed  up  one  by  one  all 
competing  thoughts  and  recollections,  and  made 
his  brain  its  slave. 

Even  as  he  strode  back  through  the  woods  to 
the  camp-meeting,  it  was  the  kiss  that  kept  his 
feet  in  motion,  and  guided  their  automatic  course. 
All  along  the  watches  of  the  restless  night,  it  was 
the  kiss  that  bore  him  sweet  company,  and  wan 
dered  with  him  from  one  broken  dream  of  bliss  to 
another.  Next  day,  it  was  the  kiss  that  made  of 
life  for  him  a  sort  of  sunlit  wonderland.  He 
preached  his  sermon  in  the  morning,  and  took  his 
appointed  part  in  the  other  services  of  afternoon 
and  evening,  apparently  to  everybody's  satisfac 
tion  :  to  him  it  was  all  a  vision. 

When  the  beautiful  full  moon  rose,  this  Sunday 
evening,  and  glorified  the  clearing  and  the  forest 
with  its  mellow  harvest  radiance,  he  could  have 
groaned  with  the  burden  of  his  joy.  He  went  out 

389 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

alone  into  the  light,  and  bared  his  head  to  it,  and 
stood  motionless  for  a  long  time.  In  all  his  life, 
he  had  never  been  impelled  as  powerfully  toward 
earnest  and  soulful  thanksgiving.  The  impulse  to 
kneel,  there  in  the  pure,  tender  moonlight,  and 
lift  up  offerings  of  praise  to  God,  kept  uppermost 
in  his  mind.  Some  formless  reservation  restrained 
him  from  the  act  itself,  but  the  spirit  of  it  hallowed 
his  mood.  He  gazed  up  at  the  broad  luminous 
face  of  the  satellite.  "  You  are  our  God,"  he 
murmured.  "  Hers  and  mine  !  You  are  the 
most  beautiful  of  heavenly  creatures,  as  she  is  of 
the  angels  on  earth.  I  am  speechless  with  rever 
ence  for  you  both." 

It  was  not  until  the  camp- meeting  broke  up, 
four  days  later,  and  Theron  with  the  rest  returned 
to  town,  that  the  material  aspects  of  what  had  hap 
pened,  and  might  be  expected  to  happen,  forced 
themselves  upon  his  mind.  The  kiss  was  a  child 
of  the  forest.  So  long  as  Theron  remained  in  the 
camp,  the  image  of  the  kiss,  which  was  enshrined 
in  his  heart  and  ministered  to  by  all  his  thoughts, 
continued  enveloped  in  a  haze  of  sylvan  mystery, 
like  a  dryad.'  Suggestions  of  its  beauty  and  holi 
ness  came  to  him  in  the  odors  of  the  woodland, 
at  the  sight  of  wild  flowers  and  water-lilies. 
When  he  walked  alone  in  unfamiliar  parts  of  thus 
forest,  he  carried  about  with  him  the  half-conscious 
idea  of  somewhere  coming  upon  a  strange,  hidden 
pool  which  mortal  eye  had  not  seen  before,  —  a 

39° 


deep,  sequestered  mere  of  spring-fed  waters,  walled 
in  by  rich,  tangled  growths  of  verdure,  and  bear 
ing  upon  its  virgin  bosom  only  the  shadows  of  the 
primeval  wilderness,  and  the  light  of  the  eternal 
skies.  His  fancy  dwelt  upon  some  such  nook  as 
the  enchanted  home  of  the  fairy  that  possessed  his 
soul.  The  place,  though  he  never  found  it,  be 
came  real  to  him.  As  he  pictured  it,  there  rose 
sometimes  from  among  the  lily-pads,  stirring  the 
translucent  depths  and  fluttering  over  the  water's 
surface  drops  like  gems,  the  wonderful  form  of  a 
woman,  with  pale  leaves  wreathed  in  her  luxuriant 
red  hair,  and  a  skin  which  gave  forth  light. 

With  the  home-coming  to  Octavius,  his  dreams 
began  to  take  more  account  of  realities.  In  a  day 
or  two  he  was  wide  awake,  and  thinking  hard. 
The  kiss  was  as  much  as  ever  the  ceaseless  com 
panion  of  his  hours,  but  it  no  longer  insisted  upon 
shrouding  itself  in  vines  and  woodland  creepers,  or 
outlining  itself  in  phosphorescent  vagueness  against 
mystic  backgrounds  of  nymph- haunted  glades.  It 
advanced  out  into  the  noonday,  and  assumed 
tangible  dimensions  and  substance.  He  saw  that 
it  was  related  to  the  facts  of  his  daily  life,  and  had, 
in  turn,  altered  his  own  relations  to  all  these 
facts. 

What  ought  he  to  do?  What  could  he  do? 
Apparently,  nothing  but  wait.  He  waited  for  a 
week,  —  then  for  another  week.  The  conclusion 
that  the  initiative  had  been  left  to  him  began  to 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

take  shape  in  his  mind.     From  this  it  seemed  but 
a  step  to  the  passionate  resolve  to  act  at  once. 

Turning  the  situation  over  and  over  in  his 
anxious  thoughts,  two  things  stood  out  in  special 
prominence.  One  was  that  Celia  loved  him. 
The  other  was  that  the  boy  in  Gorringe's  law 
office,  and  possibly  Gorringe,  and  heaven  only 
knew  how  many  others  besides,  had  reasons  for 
suspecting  this  to  be  true. 

And  what  about  Celia?  Side  by  side  with  the 
moving  rapture  of  thinking  about  her  as  a  woman, 
there  rose  the  substantial  satisfaction  of  contem 
plating  her  as  Miss  Madden.  She  had  kissed  him, 
and  she  was  very  rich.  The  things  gradually 
linked  themselves  before  his  eyes.  He  tried  a 
thousand  varying  guesses  at  what  she  proposed  to 
do,  and  each  time  reined  up  his  imagination  by 
the  reminder  that  she  was  confessedly  a  creature 
of  whims,  who  proposed  to  do  nothing,  but  was 
capable  of  all  things. 

And  as  to  the  boy.  If  he  had  blabbed  what  he 
saw,  it  was  incredible  that  somebody  should  not 
take  the  subject  up,  and  impart  a  scandalous  twist 
to  it,  and  send  it  rolling  like  a  snowball  to  gather 
up  exaggeration  and  foul  innuendo  till  it  was  big 
enough  to  overwhelm  him.  What  would  happen 
to  him  if  a  formal  charge  were  preferred  against 
him?  He  looked  it  up  in  the  Discipline.  Of 
course,  if  his  accusers  magnified  their  mean  sus 
picions  and  calumnious  imaginings  to  the  point  of 

392 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

formulating  a  charge,  it  would  be  one  of  immo 
rality.  They  could  prove  nothing ;  there  was  noth 
ing  to  prove.  At  the  worst,  it  was  an  indiscretion, 
which  would  involve  his  being  admonished  by  his 
Presiding  Elder.  Or  if  these  narrow  bigots  con 
fused  slanders  with  proofs,  and  showed  that  they 
intended  to  convict  him,  then  it  would  be  open  to 
him  to  withdraw  from  the  ministry,  in  advance  of 
his  condemnation.  His  relation  to  the  church 
would  be  the  same  as  if  he  had  been  expelled,  but 
to  the  outer  world  it  would  be  different.  And 
supposing  he  did  withdraw  from  the  ministry? 

Yes ;  this  was  the  important  point.  What  if  he 
did  abandon  this  mistaken  profession  of  his?  On 
its  mental  side  the  relief  would  be  prodigious, 
unthinkable.  But  on  the  practical  side,  the  bread- 
and-butter  side?  For  some  days  Theron  paused 
with  a  shudder  when  he  reached  this  question. 
The  thought  of  the  plunge  into  unknown  material 
responsibilities  gave  him  a  sinking  heart.  He 
tried  to  imagine  himself  lecturing,  canvassing  for 
books  or  insurance  policies,  writing  for  newspapers 
—  and  remained  frightened.  But  suddenly  one 
day  it  occurred  to  him  that  these  qualms  and 
forebodings  were  sheer  folly.  Was  not  Celia 
rich?  Would  she  not  with  lightning  swiftness 
draw  forth  that  check-book,  like  the  flashing  sword 
of  a  champion  from  its  scabbard,  and  run  to  his 
relief?  Why,  of  course.  It  was  absurd  not  to 
have  thought  of  that  before. 

393 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

He  recalled  her  momentary  anger  with  him, 
that  afternoon  in  the  woods,  when  he  had  cried 
out  that  discovery  would  mean  ruin  to  him.  He 
saw  clearly  enough  now  that  she  had  been  grieved 
at  his  want  of  faith  in  her  protection.  In  his 
flurry  of  fright,  he  had  lost  sight  of  the  fact  that, 
if  exposure  and  trouble  came  to  him,  she  would 
naturally  feel  that  she  had  been  the  cause  of  his 
martyrdom.  It  was  plain  enough  now.  If  he 
got  into  hot  water,  it  would  be  solely  on  account 
of  his  having  been  seen  with  her.  He  had  walked 
into  the  woods  with  her,  —  "  the  further  the  better  " 
had  been  her  own  words,  —  out  of  pure  kindliness, 
and  the  desire  to  lead  her  away  from  the  scene  of 
her  brother's  and  her  own  humiliation.  But  why 
amplify  arguments?  Her  own  warm  heart  would 
tell  her,  on  the  instant,  how  he  had  been  sacri 
ficed  for  her  sake,  and  would  bring  her,  eager 
and  devoted,  to  his  succor. 

That  was  all  right,  then.  Slowly,  from  this  point, 
suggestions  expanded  themselves.  The  future 
could  be,  if  he  willed  it,  one  long  serene  triumph 
of  love,  and  lofty  intellectual  companionship,  and 
existence  softened  and  enriched  at  every  point  by 
all  that  wealth  could  command,  and  the  most 
exquisite  tastes  suggest.  Should  he  will  it !  Ah  ! 
the  question  answered  itself.  But  he  could  not 
enter  upon  this  beckoning  heaven  of  a  future 
until  he  had  freed  himself.  When  Celia  said  to 
him,  "  Come  !  "  he  must  not  be  in  the  position  to 

394 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

reply,  "I  should  like  to,  but  unfortunately  I  am 
tied  by  the  leg."  He  should  have  to  leave  Octa- 
vius,  leave  the  ministry,  leave  everything.  He 
could  not  begin  too  soon  to  face  these  contin 
gencies. 

Very  likely  Celia  had  not  thought  it  out  as  far 
as  this.  With  her,  it  was  a  mere  vague  "  some 
time  I  may."  But  the  harder  masculine  sense, 
Theron  felt,  existed  for  the  very  purpose  of  cor 
recting  and  giving  point  to  these  loose  feminine 
notions  of  time  and  space.  It  was  for  him  to 
clear  away  the  obstacles,  and  map  the  plans  out 
with  definite  decision. 

One  warm  afternoon,  as  he  lolled  in  his  easy- 
chair  under  the  open  window  of  his  study,  musing 
upon  the  ever-shifting  phases  of  this  vast,  com 
plicated,  urgent  problem,  some  chance  words  from 
the  sidewalk  in  front  came  to  his  ears,  and,  coming, 
remained  to  clarify  his  thoughts. 

Two  ladies  whose  voices  were  strange  to  him 
had  stopped  —  as  so  many  people  almost  daily 
stopped  —  to  admire  the  garden  of  the  parsonage. 
One  of  them  expressed  her  pleasure  in  general 
terms.  Said  the  other,  — 

"  My  husband  declares  those  dahlias  alone 
couldn't  be  matched  for  fifty  dollars,  and  that 
some  of  those  gladiolus  must  have  cost  three  or 
four  dollars  apiece.  I  know  we've  spent  simply 
ocears  of  money  on  our  garden,  and  it  does  n't 
begin  to  compare  with  this." 

395 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  It  seems  like  a  sinful  waste  to  me,"  said  her 
companion. 

"No-o,"  the  other  hesitated.  "No,  I  don't 
think  quite  that  —  if  you  can  afford  it  just  as  well 
as  not.  But  it  does  seem  to  me  that  I  'd  rather 
live  in  a  little  better  house,  and  not  spend  it  all 
on  flowers.  Just  look  at  that  cactus  !  " 

The  voices  died  away.  Theron  sat  up,  with  a 
look  of  arrested  thought  upon  his  face,  then  sprang 
to  his  feet  and  mpved  hurriedly  through  the  parlor 
to  an  open  front  window.  Peering  out  with 
caution  he  saw  that  the  two  women  receding  from 
view  were  fashionably  dressed  and  evidently  came 
from  homes  of  means.  He  stared  after  them  in 
a  blank  way  until  they  turned  a  corner. 

He  went  into  the  hall  then,  put  on  his  frock- 
coat  and  hat,  and  stepped  out  into  the  garden. 
He  was  conscious  of  having  rather  avoided  it 
heretofore,  —  not  altogether  without  reasons  of 
his  own,  lying  unexamined  somewhere  in  the 
recesses  of  his  mind.  Now  he  walked  slowly 
about,  and  examined  the  flowers  with  great  atten- 
tiveness.  The  season  was  advancing,  and  he  saw 
that  many  plants  had  gone  out  of  bloom.  But 
what  a  magnificent  plenitude  of  blossoms  still 
remained  ! 

Fifty  dollars'  worth  of  dahlias,  —  that  was  what 
the  stranger  had  said.  Theron  hardly  brought 
himself  to  credit  the  statement ;  but  all  the  same 
it  was  apparent  to  even  his  uninformed  eye  that 

396 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

these  huge,  imbricated,  flowering  masses,  with 
their  extraordinary  half-colors,  must  be  unusual. 
He  remembered  that  the  boy  in  Gorringe's  office 
had  spoken  of  just  one  lot  of  plants  costing  thirty- 
one  dollars  and  sixty  cents,  and  there  had  been 
two  other  lots  as  well.  The  figures  remained  sur 
prisingly  distinct  in  his  memory.  It  was  no  good 
deceiving  himself  any  longer :  of  course  these 
were  the  plants  that  Gorringe  had  spent  his  money 
upon,  here  all  about  him. 

As  he  surveyed  them  with  a  sour  regard,  a  cool 
breeze  stirred  across  the  garden.  The  tall,  over 
laden  flower-spikes  of  gladioli  bent  and  nodded 
at  him ;  the  hollyhocks  and  flaming  alvias,  the 
clustered  blossoms  on  the  standard  roses,  the  deli 
cately  painted  lilies  on  their  stilt-like  stems,  fluttered 
in  the  wind,  and  seemed  all  bowing  satirically  to 
him.  "  Yes,  Levi  Gorringe  paid  for  us  !  "  He 
almost  heard  their  mocking  declaration. 

Out  in  the  back- yard,  where  a  longer  day  of 
sunshine  dwelt,  there  were  many  other  flowers,  and 
notably  a  bed  of  geraniums  which  literally  made 
the  eye  ache.  Standing  at  this  rear  corner  of  the 
house,  he  caught  the  droning  sound  of  Alice's  voice, 
humming  a  hymn  to  herself  as  she  went  about  her 
kitchen  work.  He  saw  her  through  the  open  win 
dow.  She  was  sweeping,  and  had  a  sort  of  cap  on 
her  head  which  did  not  add  to  the  graces  of  her  ap 
pearance.  He  looked  at  her  with  a  hard  glance, 
recalling  as  a  fresh  grievance  the  ten  days  of  intoler^ 

397 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

able  boredom  he  had  spent  cooped  up  in  a  ridicu 
lous  little  tent  with  her,  at  the  camp-meeting.  She 
must  have  realized  at  the  time  how  odious  the  en 
forced  companionship  was  to  him.  Yes,  beyond 
doubt  she  did.  It  came  back  to  him  now  that  they 
had  spoken  but  rarely  to  each  other.  She  had  not 
even  praised  his  sermon  upon  the  Sabbath-question, 
which  every  one  else  had  been  in  raptures  over. 
For  that  matter  she  no  longer  praised  anything  he 
did,  and  took  obvious  pains  to  preserve  toward  him 
a  distant  demeanor.  So  much  the  better,  he  felt 
himself  thinking.  If  she  chose  to  behave  in  that 
offish  and  unwifely  fashion,  she  could  blame  no  one 
but  herself  for  its  results. 

She  had  seen  him,  and  came  now  to  the  window, 
watering-pot  and  broom  in  hand.  She  put  her 
head  out,  to  breathe  a  breath  of  dustless  air,  and 
began  as  if  she  would  smile  on  him.  Then  her 
face  chilled  and  stiffened,  as  she  caught  his  look. 

"  Shall  you  be  home  for  supper?  "  she  asked,  in 
her  iciest  tone. 

He  had  not  thought  of  going  out  before.  The 
question,  and  the  manner  of  it,  gave  immediate 
urgency  to  the  idea  of  going  somewhere.  "  I  may 
or  I  may  not,"  he  replied.  "  It  is  quite  impossible 
for  me  to  say."  He  turned  on  his  heel  with  this, 
and  walked  briskly  out  of  the  yard  and  down  the 
street. 

It  was  the  most  natural  thing  that  presently  he 
should  be  strolling  past  the  Madden  house,  and  let- 

39* 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ting  a  covert  glance  stray  over  its  front  and  the 
grounds  about  it,  as  he  loitered  along.  Every  day 
since  his  return  from  the  woods  he  had  given  the 
fates  this  chance  of  bringing  Celia  to  meet  him, 
without  avail.  He  had  hung  about  in  the  vicinity 
of  the  Catholic  church  on  several  evenings  as  well, 
but  to  no  purpose.  The  organ  inside  was  dumb, 
and  he  could  detect  no  signs  of  Celia's  presence 
on  the  curtains  of  the  pastorate  next  door.  This 
day,  too,  there  was  no  one  visible  at  the  home  of 
the  Maddens,  and  he  walked  on,  a  little  sadly.  It 
was  weary  work  waiting  for  the  signal  that  never 
came. 

But  there  were  compensations.  His  mind  re 
verted  doggedly  to  the  flowers  in  his  garden,  and 
to  Alice's  behavior  toward  him.  They  insisted 
upon  connecting  themselves  in  his  thoughts.  Why 
should  Levi  Gorringe,  a  money-lender,  and  there 
fore  the  last  man  in  the  world  to  incur  reckless 
expenditure,  go  and  buy  perhaps  a  hundred  dollars' 
worth  of  flowers  for  his  wife's  garden?  It  was 
time  —  high  time  —  to  face  this  question.  And 
his  experiencing  religion  afterward,  just  when  Alice 
did,  and  marching  down  to  the  rail  to  kneel  beside 
her,  —  that  was  a  thing  to  be  thought  of,  too. 

Meditation,  it  is  true,  hardly  threw  fresh  light 
upon  the  matter.  It  was  incredible,  of  course, 
that  there  should  be  anything  wrong.  To  even 
shape  a  thought  of  Alice  in  connection  with  gal 
lantry  would  be  wholly  impossible.  Nor  could  it 

399 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

be  said  that  Gorringe,  in  his  new  capacity  as  a 
professing  church- member,  had  disclosed  any  sign 
of  ulterior  motives,  or  of  insincerity.  Yet  there  the 
facts  were.  While  Theron  pondered  them,  their 
mystery,  if  they  involved  a  mystery,  baffled  him 
altogether.  But  when  he  had  finished,  he  found 
himself  all  the  same  convinced  that  neither  Alice 
nor  Gorringe  would  be  free  to  blame  him  for  any 
thing  he  might  do.  He  had  grounds  for  complaint 
against  them.  If  he  did  not  himself  know  just 
what  these  grounds  were,  it  was  certain  enough 
that  they  knew.  Very  well,  then,  let  them  take  the 
responsibility  for  what  happened. 

It  was  indeed  awkward  that  at  the  moment,  as 
Theron  chanced  to  emerge  temporarily  from  his 
brown-study,  his  eyes  fell  full  upon  the  spare,  well- 
knit  form  of  Levi  Gorringe  himself,  standing  only 
a  few  feet  away,  in  the  staircase  entrance  to  his 
law  office.  His  lean  face,  browned  by  the  summer's 
exposure,  had  a  more  Arabian  aspect  than  ever. 
His  hands  were  in  his  pockets,  and  he  held  an 
unlighted  cigar  between  his  teeth.  He  looked  the 
Rev.  Mr.  Ware  over  calmly,  and  nodded  recognition. 

Theron  had  halted  instinctively.  On  the  instant 
he  would  have  given  a  great  deal  not  to  have 
stopped  at  all.  It  was  stupid  of  him  to  have 
paused,  but  it  would  not  do  now  to  go  on  without 
words  of  some  sort.  He  moved  over  to  the  door 
way,  and  made  a  half-hearted  pretence  of  looking 
at  the  photographs  in  one  of  the  show-cases  at  its 

400 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

side.  As  Mr.  Gorringe  did  not  take  his  hands  from 
his  pockets,  there  was  no  occasion  for  any  formal 
greeting. 

"  I  had  no  idea  that  they  took  such  good  pictures 
in  Octavius,"  Theron  remarked  after  a  minute's 
silence,  still  bending  in  examination  of  the 
photographs. 

"  They  ought  to ;  they  charge  New  York  prices," 
observed  the  lawyer,  sententiously. 

Theron  found  in  the  words  confirmation  of  his 
feeling  that  Gorringe  was  not  naturally  a  lavish  or 
extravagant  man.  Rather  was  he  a  careful  and 
calculating  man,  who  spent  money  only  for  a  pur 
pose.  Though  the  minister  continued  gazing  at 
the  stiff  presentments  of  local  beauties  and  swains, 
his  eyes  seemed  to  see  salmon-hued  hollyhocks 
and  spotted  lilies  instead.  Suddenly  a  resolve 
came  to  him.  He  stood  erect,  and  faced  his 
trustee. 

"  Speaking  of  the  price  of  things,"  he  said,  with 
an  effort  of  arrogance  in  his  measured  tone,  "  I 
have  never  had  an  opportunity  before  of  mention 
ing  the  subject  of  the  flowers  you  have  so  kindly 
furnished  for  my  —  for  my  garden." 

"  Why  mention  it  now?  "  queried  Gorringe,  with 
nonchalance.  He  turned  his  cigar  about  with  a 
movement  of  his  lips,  and  worked  it  into  the 
corner  of  his  mouth.  He  did  not  find  it  neces 
sary  to  look  at  Theron  at  all. 

"  Because,"  began  Mr.  Ware,  and  then  hesitated 
26  401 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

—  "because  —  well,  it  raises  a  question  of  my 
being  under  obligation,  which  I  —  " 

"  Oh,  no,  sir,"  said  the  lawyer ;  "  put  that  out 
of  your  mind.  You  are  no  more  under  obligation 
to  me  than  I  am  to  you.  Oh,  no,  make  yourself 
easy  about  that.  Neither  of  us  owes  the  other 
anything." 

"  Not  even  good-will,  —  I  take  that  to  be  your 
meaning,"  retorted  Theron,  with  some  heat. 

"The  words  are  yours,  sir,"  responded  Gorringe, 
coolly.  "  I  do  not  object  to  them." 

"As  you  like,"  put  in  the  other.  "  If  it  be  so, 
why,  then  all  the  more  reason  why  I  should,  under 
the  circumstances — ." 

"Under  what  circumstances?"  interposed  the 
lawyer.  "  Let  us  be  clear  about  this  thing  as  we 
go  along.  To  what  circumstances  do  you  refer?" 

He  had  turned  his  eyes  now,  and  looked  Theron 
in  the  face.  A  slight  protrusion  of  his  lower  jaw 
had  given  the  cigar  an  upward  tilt  under  the  black 
mustache. 

"The  circumstances  are  that  you  have  brought 
or  sent  to  my  garden  a  great  many  very  expensive 
flower-plants  and  bushes  and  so  on." 

"And  you  object?  I  had  not  supposed  that 
clergymen  in  general  —  and  you  in  particular  — 
were  so  sensitive.  Have  donation  parties,  then, 
gone  out  of  date?  " 

"  I  understand  your  sneer  well  enough,"  re 
torted  Theron,  "  but  that  can  pass.  The  main 

402 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

point  is.  that  you  did  me  the  honor  to  send  these 
plants,  —  or  to  smuggle  them  in,  —  but  never  once 
deigned  to  hint  to  me  that  you  had  done  so.  No 
one  told  me.  Except  by  mere  accident,  I  should 
not  have  known  to  this  day  where  they  came 
from." 

Mr.  Gorringe  twisted  the  cigar  at  another  angle, 
with  lines  of  grim  amusement  about  the  corner  of 
his  mouth.  "  I  should  have  thought,"  he  said  with 
dry  deliberation,  "  that  possibly  this  fact  might 
have  raised  in  your  mind  the  conceivable  hypothe 
sis  that  the  plants  might  not  be  intended  for  you 
at  all." 

"That  is  precisely  it,  sir,"  said  Theron.  There 
were  people  passing,  and  he  was  forced  to  keep  his 
voice  down.  It  would  have  been  a  relief,  he  felt, 
to  shout.  "  That  is  it,  —  they  were  not  intended 
for  me." 

"Well,  then,  what  are  you  talking  about?" 
The  lawyer's  speech  had  become  abrupt  almost  to 
incivility. 

"  I  think  my  remarks  have  been  perfectly  clear," 
said  the  minister,  with  dignity.  It  was  a  new 
experience  to  be  addressed  in  that  fashion.  It 
occurred  to  him  to  add,  "  Please  remember  that 
I  am  not  in  the  witness-box,  to  be  bullied  or 
insulted  by  a  professional." 

Gorringe  studied  Theron's  face  attentively  with 
a  cold,  searching  scrutiny.  "  You  may  thank  your 
stars  you  're  not !  "  he  said,  with  significance. 

403 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

What  on  earth  could  he  mean  ?  The  words  and 
the  menacing  tone  greatly  impressed  Theron.  In 
deed,  upon  reflection,  he  found  that  they  fright 
ened  him.  The  disposition  to  adopt  a  high  tone 
with  the  lawyer  was  melting  away. 

"  I  do  not  see,"  he  began,  and  then  deliberately 
allowed  his  voice  to  take  on  an  injured  and  plain 
tive  inflection,  —  "I  do  not  see  why  you  should 
adopt  this  tone  toward  me  —  Brother  Gorringe." 

The  lawyer  scowled,  and  bit  sharply  into  the 
cigar,  but  said  nothing. 

"  If  I  have  unconsciously  offended  you  in  any 
way,"  Theron  went  on, "  I  beg  you  to  tell  me  how. 
I  liked  you  from  the  beginning  of  my  pastorate 
here,  and  the  thought  that  latterly  we  seemed  to 
be  drifting  apart  has  given  me  much  pain.  But 
now  it  is  still  more  distressing  to  find  you  actually 
disposed  to  quarrel  with  me.  Surely,  Brother 
Gorringe,  between  a  pastor  and  a  probationer 
who  —  " 

"No,"  Gorringe  broke  in;  "quarrel  isn't  the 
word  for  it.  There  isn't  any  quarrel,  Mr.  Ware." 
He  stepped  down  from  the  door-stone  to  the  side 
walk  as  he  spoke,  and  stood  face  to  face  with 
Theron.  Working-men  with  dinner-pails,  and 
factory  girls,  were  passing  close  to  them,  and  he 
lowered  his  voice  to  a  sharp,  incisive  half-whisper 
as  he  added,  "  It  would  n't  be  worth  any  grown 
man's  while  to  quarrel  with  so  poor  a  creature  as 
you  are." 

404 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Theron  stood  confounded,  with  an  empty  stare 
of  bewilderment  on  his  face.  It  rose  in  his  mind 
that  the  right  thing  to  feel  was  rage,  righteous 
indignation,  fury ;  but  for  the  life  of  him,  he  could 
not  muster  any  manly  anger.  The  character  of 
the  insult  stupefied  him. 

"  I  do  not  know  that  I  have  anything  to  say  to 
you  in  reply,"  he  remarked,  after  what  seemed  to 
him  a  silence  of  minutes.  His  lips  framed  the 
words  automatically,  but  they  expressed  well 
enough  the  blank  vacancy  of  his  mind.  The 
suggestion  that  anybody  deemed  him  a  "poor 
creature  "  grew  more  astounding,  incomprehensi 
ble,  as  it  swelled  in  his  brain. 

"  No,  I  suppose  not,"  snapped  Gorringe. 
"  You  're  not  the  sort  to  stand  up  to  men ;  your 
form  is  to  go  round  the  corner  and  take  it  out  of 
somebody  weaker  than  yourself,  —  a  defenceless 
woman,  for  instance." 

"  Oh  —  ho  !  "  said  Theron.  The  exclamation 
had  uttered  itself.  The  sound  of  it  seemed  to 
clarify  his  muddled  thoughts ;  and  as  they  ranged 
themselves  in  order,  he  began  to  understand. 
"  Oh  —  ho  !  "  he  said  again,  and  nodded  his  head 
in  token  of  comprehension. 

The  lawyer,  chewing  his  cigar  with  increased 
activity,  glared  at  him.  "  What  do  you  mean  ?  " 
he  demanded  peremptorily. 

"  Mean  ?  "  said  the  minister.  "  Oh,  nothing 
that  I  feel  called  upon  to  explain  to  you." 

405 


THE  DAMNATION   OF  THERON   WARE 

It  was  passing  strange,  but  his  self-possession 
had  all  at  once  returned  to  him.  As  it  became 
more  apparent  that  the  lawyer  was  losing  his 
temper,  Theron  found  the  courage  to  turn  up 
the  corners  of  his  lips  in  show  of  a  bitter  little 
smile  of  confidence.  He  looked  into  the  other's 
dusky  face,  and  flaunted  this  smile  at  it  in  con 
temptuous  defiance.  "  It  is  not  a  subject  that  I 
can  discuss  with  propriety  —  at  this  stage,"  he 
added. 

"  Damn  you  !  Are  you  talking  about  those 
flowers?" 

"  Oh,  I  am  not  talking  about  anything  in  par 
ticular,"  returned  Theron,  "  not  even  the  curious 
choice  of  language  which  my  latest  probationer 
seems  to  prefer." 

"Go  and  strike  my  name  off  the  list!"  said 
Gorringe,  with  rising  passion.  "  I  was  a  fool  to 
ever  have  it  there.  To  think  of  being  a  proba 
tioner  of  yours  —  my  God  !  " 

"That  will  be  a  pity  —  from  one  point  of  view," 
remarked  Theron,  still  with  the  ironical  smile  on 
his  lips.  "  You  seemed  to  enter  upon  the  new  life 
with  such  deliberation  and  fixity  of  purpose,  too  ! 
I  can  imagine  the  regrets  your  withdrawal  will 
cause,  in  certain  quarters.  I  only  hope  that  it  will 
not  discourage  those  who  accompanied  you  to  the 
altar,  and  shared  your  enthusiasm  at  the  time." 
He  had  spoken  throughout  with  studied  slowness 
and  an  insolent  nicety  of  utterance. 

406 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  You  had  better  go  away  !  "  broke  forth  Gor- 
ringe.  "If  you  don't,  I  shall  forget  myself." 

"For  the  first  time?"  asked  Theron.  Then, 
warned  by  the  flash  in  the  lawyer's  eye,  he  turned 
on  his  heel  and  sauntered,  with  a  painstaking 
assumption  of  a  mind  quite  at  ease,  up  the 
street. 

Gorringe's  own  face  twitched  and  his  veins 
tingled  as  he  looked  after  him.  He  spat  the 
shapeless  cigar  out  of  his  mouth  into  the  gutter,  and, 
drawing  forth  another  from  his  pocket,  clenched  it 
between  his  teeth,  his  gaze  following  the  tall  form 
of  the  Methodist  minister  till  it  was  merged  in 
the  crowd. 

"  Well,  I  'm  damned  !  "  he  said  aloud  to  himselt. 

The  photographer  had  come  down  to  take  in  his 
show-cases  for  the  night.  He  looked  up  from  his 
task  at  the  exclamation,  and  grinned  inquiringly. 

"  I  Ve  just  been  talking  to  a  man,"  said  the 
lawyer,  "  who  's  so  much  meaner  than  any  other 
man  I  ever  heard  of  that  it  takes  my  breath  away. 
He  's  got  a  wife  that 's  as  pure  and  good  as  gold, 
and  he  knows  it,  and  she  worships  the  ground  he 
walks  on,  and  he  knows  that  too.  And  yet  the 
scoundrel  is  around  trying  to  sniff  out  some  shadow 
of  a  pretext  for  misusing  her  worse  than  he 's 
already  done.  Yes,  sir ;  he  'd  be  actually  tickled 
to  death  if  he  could  nose  up  some  hint  of  a 
scandal  about  her,  —  something  that  he  could  pre 
tend  to  believe,  and  work  for  his  own  advantage, 

407 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

to  levy  blackmail,  or  get  rid  of  her,  or  whatever 
suited  his  book.  I  did  n't  think  there  was  such  an 
out-and-out  cur  on  this  whole  footstool.  I  almost 
wish,  by  God,  I  'd  thrown  him  into  the  canal !  " 

"  Yes,  you  lawyers  must  run  against  some  pretty 
snide  specimens,"  remarked  the  photographer, 
lifting  one  of  the  cases  from  its  sockets. 


408 


CHAPTER  XXVI 

THERON  spent  half  an  hour  in  aimless  strolling 
about  the  streets.  From  earliest  boyhood  his 
mind  had  always  worked  most  clearly  when  he 
walked  alone.  Every  mental  process  which  had 
left  a  mark  upon  his  memory  and  his  career,  — 
the  day-dreams  of  future  academic  greatness  and 
fame  which  had  fashjoned  themselves  in  his  brain 
as  a  farm  lad ;  the  meditations,  raptures,  and  high 
resolves  of  his  student  period  at  the  seminary ;  the 
more  notable  sermons  and  powerful  discourses  by 
which  he  had  revealed  the  genius  that  was  in 
him  to  astonished  and  delighted  assemblages, — all 
were  associated  in  his  retrospective  thoughts  with 
solitary  rambles. 

He  had  a  very  direct  and  vivid  consciousness 
now  that  it  was  good  to  be  on  his  legs,  and  alone. 
He  had  never  in  his  life  been  more  sensible  of  the 
charm  of  his  own  companionship.  The  encounter 
with  Gorringe  seemed  to  have  cleared  all  the 
clouds  out  of  his  brain,  and  restored  lightness  to 
his  heart.  After  such  an  object  lesson,  the  impos 
sibility  of  his  continuing  to  sacrifice  himself  to  a 
notion  of  duty  to  these  low-minded  and  coarse- 
natured  villagers  was  beyond  all  argument.  There 

409 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

could  no  longer  be  any  doubt  about  his  moral 
right  to  turn  his  back  upon  them,  to  wash  his 
hands  of  the  miserable  combination  of  hypocrisy 
and  hysterics  which  they  called  their  spiritual 
life. 

And  the  question  of  Gorringe  and  Alice,  that 
too  stood  precisely  where  he  wanted  it.  Even  in 
his  own  thoughts,  he  preferred  to  pursue  it  no 
further.  Between  them  somewhere  an  offence  of 
concealment,  it  might  be  of  conspiracy,  had  been 
committed  against  him.  It  was  no  business  of  his 
to  say  more,  or  to  think  more.  He  rested  his  case 
simply  on  the  fact,  which  could  not  be  denied,  and 
which  he  was  not  in  the  least  interested  to  have 
explained,  one  way  or  the  other.  The  recollection 
of  Gorringe's  obvious  disturbance  of  mind  was 
especially  pleasant  to  him.  He  himself  had  been 
magnanimous  almost  to  the  point  of  weakness. 
He  had  gone  out  of  his  way  to  call  the  man 
"  brother,"  and  to  give  him  an  opportunity  of 
behaving  like  a  gentleman ;  but  his  kindly  for 
bearance  had  been  wasted.  Gorringe  was  not  the 
man  to  understand  generous  feelings,  much  less 
rise  to  their  level.  He  had  merely  shown  that  he 
would  be  vicious  if  he  knew  how.  It  was  more 
important  and  satisfactory  to  recall  that  he  had 
also  shown  a  complete  comprehension  of  the 
injured  husband's  grievance.  The  fact  that  he 
had  recognized  it  was  enough,  —  was,  in  fact, 
everything. 

410 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

In  the  background  of  his  thoughts  Theron 
had  carried  along  a  notion  of  going  and  dining 
with  Father  Forbes  when  the  time  for  the  evening 
meal  should  arrive.  The  idea  in  itself  attracted 
him,  as  a  fitting  capstone  to  his  resolve  not  to  go 
home  to  supper.  It  gave  just  the  right  kind  of 
character  to  his  domestic  revolt.  But  when  at  last 
he  stood  on  the  doorstep  of  the  pastorate,  waiting 
for  an  answer  to  the  tinkle  of  the  electric  bell  he 
had  heard  ring  inside,  his  mind  contained  only  the 
single  thought  that  now  he  should  hear  something 
about  Celia.  Perhaps  he  might  even  find  her 
there ;  but  he  put  that-  suggestion  aside  as  slightly 
unpleasant. 

The  hag-faced  housekeeper  led  him,  as  before, 
into  the  dining-room.  It  was  still  daylight,  and 
he  saw  on  the  glance  that  the  priest  was  alone  at 
the  table,  with  a  book  beside  him  to  read  from 
as  he  ate. 

Father  Forbes  rose  and  came  forward,  greeting 
his  visitor  with  profuse  urbanity  and  smiles.  If 
there  was  a  perfunctory  note  in  the  invitation  to  sit 
down  and  share  the  meal,  Theron  did  not  catch  it. 
He  frankly  displayed  his  pleasure  as  he  laid  aside 
his  hat,  and  took  the  chair  opposite  his  host. 

"  It  is  really  only  a  few  months  since  I  was 
here,  in  this  room,  before,"  he  remarked,  as  the 
priest  closed  his  book  and  tossed  it  to  one  side, 
and  the  housekeeper  came  in  to  lay  another  place. 
"  Yet  it  might  have  been  years,  many  long  years, 

411 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

so  tremendous  is  the  difference  that  the  lapse  of 
time  has  wrought  in  me." 

"I  am  afraid  we  have  nothing  to  tempt  you 
very  much,  Mr.  Ware,"  remarked  Father  Forbes, 
with  a  gesture  of  his  plump  white  hand  which 
embraced  the  dishes  in  the  centre  of  the 
table.  "May  I  send  you  a  bit  of  this  boiled 
mutton?  I  have  very  homely  tastes  when  I  am 
by  myself." 

"  I  was  saying,"  Theron  observed,  after  some 
moments  had  passed  in  silence,  "  that  I  date  such 
a  tremendous  revolution  in  my  thoughts,  my  beliefs, 
my  whole  mind  and  character,  from  my  first  meet 
ing  with  you,  my  first  coming  here.  I  don't  know 
how  to  describe  to  you  the  enormous  change  that 
has  come  over  me ;  and  I  owe  it  all  to  you." 

"I  can  only  hope,  then,  that  it  is  entirely 
of  a  satisfactory  nature,"  said  the  priest,  politely 
smiling. 

"  Oh,  it  is  so  splendidly  satisfactory ! "  said 
Theron,  with  fervor.  "  I  look  back  at  myself 
now  with  wonder  and  pity.  It  seems  incredible 
that,  such  a  little  while  ago,  I  should  have  been 
such  an  ignorant  and  unimaginative  clod  of  earth, 
content  with  such  petty  ambitions  and  actually 
proud  of  my  limitations." 

"And  you  have  larger  ambitions  now?"  asked 
the  other.  "  Pray  let  me  help  you  to  some  pota 
toes.  I  am  afraid  that  ambitions  only  get  in  our 
way  and  trip  us  up.  We  clergymen  are  like 

412 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

street-car  horses.  The  more  steadily  we  jog  along 
between  the  rails,  the  better  it  is  for  us." 

"  Oh,  I  don't  intend  to  remain  in  the  ministry," 
declared  Theron.  The  statement  seemed  to  him 
a  little  bald,  now  that  he  had  made  it ;  and  as  his 
companion  lifted  his  brows  in  surprise,  he  added 
stumblingly :  "  That  is,  as  I  feel  now,  it  seems  to 
me  impossible  that  I  should  remain  much  longer. 
With  you,  of  course,  it  is  different.  You  have  a 
thousand  things  to  interest  and  pleasantly  occupy 
you  in  your  work  and  its  ceremonies,  so  that 
mere  belief  or  non-belief  in  the  dogma  hardly 
matters.  But  in  our  church  dogma  is  everything. 
If  you  take  that  away,  or  cease  to  have  its  support, 
the  rest  is  intolerable,  hideous." 

Father  Forbes  cut  another  slice  of  mutton  for 
himself.  "  It  is  a  pretty  serious  business  to  make 
such  a  change  at  your  time  of  life.  I  take  it  for 
granted  you  will  think  it  all  over  very  carefully 
before  you  commit  yourself."  He  said  this  with 
an  almost  indifferent  air,  which  rather  chilled  his 
listener's  enthusiasm. 

"Oh,  yes,"  Theron  made  answer;  "I  shall  do 
nothing  rash.  But  I  have  a  good  many  plans  for 
the  future." 

Father  Forbes  did  not  ask  what  these  were,  and 
a  brief  further  period  of  silence  fell  upon  the  table. 

"  I  hope  everything  went  off  smoothly  at  the 
picnic,"  Theron  ventured,  at  last.  "  I  have  not 
seen  any  of  you  since  then." 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

The  priest  shook  his  head  and  sighed.  "  No," 
he  said.  "It  is  a  bad  business.  I  have  had  a 
great  deal  of  unhappiness  out  of  it  this  past  fort 
night.  That  young  man  who  was  rude  to  you  — 
of  course  it  was  mere  drunken,  irresponsible  non 
sense  on  his  part  —  has  got  himself  into  a  serious 
scrape,  I  'm  afraid.  It  is  being  kept  quite  within 
the  family,  and  we  hope  to  manage  so  that  it  will 
remain  there,  but  it  has  terribly  upset  his  father 
and  his  sister.  But  that,  after  all,  is  not  so  hard  to 
bear  as  the  other  affliction  that  has  come  upon  the 
Maddens.  You  remember  Michael,  the  other 
brother?  He  seems  to  have  taken  cold  that 
evening,  or  perhaps  over-excited  himself.  He  has 
been  seized  with  quick  consumption.  He  will 
hardly  last  till  snow  flies." 

"  Oh,  I  am  grieved  to  hear  that !  "  Theron 
spoke  with  tremulous  earnestness.  It  seemed  to 
him  as  if  Michael  were  in  some  way  related  to 
him. 

"  It  is  very  hard  upon  them  all,"  the  priest  went 
on.  "  Michael  is  as  sweet  and  holy  a  character 
as  it  is  possible  for  any  one  to  think  of.  He  is 
the  apple  of  his  father's  eye.  They  were  insepa 
rable,  those  two.  Do  you  know  the  father,  Mr. 
Madden?" 

Theron  shook  his  head.  "I  think  I  have  seen 
him,"  he  said.  "  A  small  man,  with  gray 
whiskers." 

"  A  peasant,"  said  Father  Forbes,  "  but  with  a 

414 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

heart  of  gold.  Poor  man  !  he  has  had  little  enough 
out  of  his  riches.  Ah,  the  West  Coast  people, 
what  tragedies  I  have  seen  among  them  over  here  ! 
They  have  rudimentary  lung  organizations,  like  a 
frog's,  to  fit  the  mild,  wet  soft  air  they  live  in. 
The  sharp  air  here  kills  them  off  like  flies  in  a 
frost.  Whole  families  go.  I  should  think  there 
are  a  dozen  of  old  Jeremiah's  children  in  the  cem 
etery.  If  Michael  could  have  passed  his  twenty- 
eighth  year,  there  would  have  been  hope  for  him, 
at  least  till  his  thirty-fifth.  These  pulmonary 
things  seem  to  go  by  sevens,  you  know." 

"  I  did  n't  know,"  said  Theron.  "It  is  very 
strange  —  and  very  sad."  His  startled  mind  was 
busy,  all  at  once,  with  conjectures  as  to  Celia's 
age. 

"  The  sister  —  Miss  Madden  —  seems  extremely 
strong,"  he  remarked  tentatively. 

"Celia  may  escape  the  general  doom,"  said  the 
priest.  His  guest  noted  that  he  clenched  his 
shapely  white  hand  on  the  table  as  he  spoke,  and 
that  his  gentle,  carefully  modulated  voice  had  a 
gritty  hardness  in  its  tone.  "  That  would  be  too 
dreadful  to  think  of,"  he  added. 

Theron  shuddered  in  silence,  and  strove  to  shut 
his  mind  against  the  thought. 

"  She  has  taken  Michael's  illness  so  deeply  to 
heart,"  the  priest  proceeded,  "and  devoted  her 
self  to  him  so  untiringly  that  I  get  a  little  nervous 
about  her.  I  have  been  urging  her  to  go  away 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  get  a  change  of  air  and  scene,  if  only  for  a  few 
days.  She  does  not  sleep  well,  and  that  is  always 
a  bad  thing." 

"  I  think  I  remember  her  telling  me  once  that 
sometimes  she  had  sleepless  spells,"  said  Theron. 
"  She  said  that  then  she  banged  on  her  piano  at 
all  hours,  or  dragged  the  cushions  about  from  room 
to  room,  like  a  wild  woman.  A  very  interesting 
young  lady,  don't  you  find  her  so?  " 

Father  Forbes  let  a  wan  smile  play  on  his  lips. 
"What,  our  Celia?"  he  said.  "  Interesting ! 
Why,  Mr.  Ware,  there  is  no  one  like  her  in  the 
world.  She  is  as  unique  as  —  what  shall  I  say  ?  — 
as  the  Irish  are  among  races.  Her  father  and 
mother  were  both  born  in  mud-cabins,  and  she  — 
she  might  be  the  daughter  of  a  hundred  kings,  ex 
cept  that  they  seem  mostly  rather  under-witted 
than  otherwise.  She  always  impresses  me  as  a  sort  of 
atavistic  idealization  of  the  old  Kelt  at  his  finest  and 
best.  There  in  Ireland  you  got  a  strange  mixture 
of  elementary  early  peoples,  walled  off  from  the 
outer  world  by  the  four  seas,  and  free  to  work  out 
their  own  racial  amalgam  on  their  own  lines. 
They  brought  with  them  at  the  outset  a  great  in 
heritance  of  Eastern  mysticism.  Others  lost  it,  but 
the  Irish,  all  alone  on  their  island,  kept  it  alive  and 
brooded  on  it,  and  rooted  their  whole  spiritual 
side  in  it.  Their  religion  is  full  of  it ;  their  blood 
is  full  of  it ;  our  Celia  is  fuller  of  it  than  anybody 
else.  The  Ireland  of  two  thousand  years  ago  is 

416 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

incarnated  in  her.  They  are  the  merriest  people  and 
the  saddest,  the  most  turbulent  and  the  most  docile, 
the  most  talented  and  the  most  unproductive,  the 
most  practical  and  the  most  visionary,  the  most 
devout  and  the  most  pagan.  These  impossible 
contradictions  war  ceaselessly  in  their  blood. 
When  I  look  at  Celia,  I  seem  to  see  in  my  mind's 
eye  the  fair  young  ancestral  mother  of  them  all." 

Theron  gazed  at  the  speaker  with  open  admira 
tion.  "  I  love  to  hear  you  talk,"  he  said  simply. 

An  unbidden  memory  flitted  upward  in  his 
mind.  Those  were  the  very  words  that  Alice  had 
so  often  on  her  lips  in  their  old  courtship  days. 
How  curious  it  was  !  He  looked  at  the  priest,  and 
had  a  quaint  sensation  of  feeling  as  a  romantic 
woman  must  feel  in  the  presence  of  a  specially 
impressive  masculine  personality.  It  was  indeed 
strange  that  this  soft-voiced,  portly  creature  in  a 
gown,  with  his  white,  fat  hands  and  his  feline  suav 
ity  of  manner,  should  produce  such  a  commanding 
and  unique  effect  of  virility.  No  doubt  this  was  a 
part  of  the  great  sex  mystery  which  historically 
surrounded  the  figure  of  the  celibate  priest  as  with 
an  atmosphere.  Women  had  always  been  pros 
trating  themselves  before  it.  Theron,  watching  his 
companion's  full,  pallid  face  in  the  lamp-light,  tried 
to  fancy  himself  in  the  priest's  place,  looking  down 
upon  these  worshipping  female  forms.  He  won 
dered  what  the  celibate's  attitude  really  was.  The 
enigma  fascinated  him. 

27  417 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Father  Forbes,  after  his  rhetorical  outburst,  had 
been  eating.  He  pushed  aside  his  cheese-plate: 
"  I  grow  enthusiastic  on  the  subject  of  my  race 
sometimes,"  he  remarked,  with  the  suggestion  of 
an  apology.  "  But  I  make  up  for  it  other  times  — 
most  of  the  time  —  by  scolding  them.  If  it  were 
not  such  a  noble  thing  to  be  an  Irishman,  it  would 
be  ridiculous." 

"Ah,"  said  Theron,  deprecatingly,  "who  would 
not  be  enthusiastic  in  talking  of  Miss  Madden? 
What  you  said  about  her  was  perfect.  As  you 
spoke,  I  was  thinking  how  proud  and  thankful  we 
ought  to  be  for  the  privilege  of  knowing  her  —  we 
who  do  know  her  well  —  although  of  course  your 
friendship  with  her  is  vastly  more  intimate  than 
mine  —  than  mine  could  ever  hope  to  be." 

The  priest  offered  no  comment,  and  Theron 
went  on :  "I  hardly  know  how  to  describe  the  re 
markable  impression  she  makes  upon  me.  I  can't 
imagine  to  myself  any  other  young  woman  so  bril 
liant  or  broad  in  her  views,  or  so  courageous.  Of 
course,  her  being  so  rich  makes  it  easier  for  her  to 
do  just  what  she  wants  to  do,  but  her  bravery  is 
astonishing  all  the  same.  We  had  a  long  and  very 
sympathetic  talk  in  the  woods,  that  day  of  the  pic 
nic,  after  we  left  you.  I  don't  know  whether  she 
spoke  to  you  about  it?  " 

Father  Forbes  made  a  movement  of  the  head 
and  eyes  which  seemed  to  negative  the  suggestion. 

"  Her  talk,"  continued  Theron,  "  gave  me  quite 

418 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

new  ideas  of  the  range  and  capacity  of  the  female 
mind.  I  wonder  that  everybody  in  Octavius  is  n't 
full  of  praise  and  admiration  for  her  talents  and 
exceptional  character.  In  such  a  small  town  as 
this,  you  would  think  she  would  be  the  centre  of 
attention,  —  the  pride  of  the  place." 

"  I  think  she  has  as  much  praise  as  is  good  for 
her,"  remarked  the  priest,  quietly. 

"  And  here  's  a  thing  that  puzzles  me,"  pursued 
Mr.  Ware.  "  I  was  immensely  surprised  to  find 
that  Dr.  Ledsmar  does  n't  even  think  she  is  smart, 
—  or  at  least  he  professes  the  utmost  intellectual 
contempt  for  her,  and  says  he  dislikes  her  into  the 
bargain.  But  of  course  she  dislikes  him,  too,  so 
that 's  only  natural.  But  I  can't  understand  his 
denying  her  great  ability." 

The  priest  smiled  in  a  dubious  way.  "  Don't 
borrow  unnecessary  alarm  about  that,  Mr.  Ware," 
he  said,  with  studied  smoothness  of  modulated 
tones.  "These  two  good  friends  of  mine  have 
much  enjoyment  out  of  the  idea  that  they  are  fight 
ing  for  the  mastery  over  my  poor  unstable  character. 
It  has  grown  to  be  a  habit  with  them,  and  a  hobby 
as  well,  and  they  pursue  it  with  tireless  zest.  There 
are  not  many  intellectual  diversions  open  to  us 
here,  and  they  make  the  most  of  this  one.  It 
amuses  them,  and  it  is  not  without  its  charms  for 
me,  in  my  capacity  as  an  interested  observer.  It 
is  a  part  of  the  game  that  they  should  pretend 
to  themselves  that  they  detest  each  other.  In 

419 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

reality  I  fancy  they  like  each  other  very  much. 
At  any  rate,  there  is  nothing  to  be  disturbed 
about/' 

His  mellifluous  tones  had  somehow  the  effect  of 
suggesting  to  Theron  that  he  was  an  outsider  and 
would  better  mind  his  own  business.  Ah,  if  this 
purring  pussy-cat  of  a  priest  only  knew  how  little 
of  an  outsider  he  really  was  !  The  thought  gave 
him  an  easy  self-control. 

"  Of  course,"  he  said,  "  our  warm  mutual  friend 
ship  makes  the  observation  of  these  little  individual 
vagaries  merely  a  part  of  a  delightful  whole.  I 
should  not  dream  of  discussing  Miss  Madden's  con 
fidences  to  me,  or  the  doctor's  either,  outside  our 
own  little  group." 

Father  Forbes  reached  behind  him  and  took 
from  a  chair  his  black  three-cornered  cap  with  the 
tassel.  "Unfortunately  I  have  a  sick  call  waiting 
me,"  he  said,  gathering  up  his  gown  and  slowly 
rising. 

"Yes,  I  saw  the  man  sitting  in  the  hall,"  re 
marked  Theron,  getting  to  his  feet. 

"  I  would  ask  you  to  go  upstairs  and  wait,"  the 
priest  went  on,  "  but  my  return,  unhappily,  is  quite 
uncertain.  Another  evening  I  may  be  more  fortu 
nate.  I  am  leaving  town  to-morrow  for  some  days, 
but  when  I  get  back —  " 

The  polite  sentence  did  not  complete  itself. 
Father  Forbes  had  come  out  into  the  hall,  giving  a 
cool  nod  to  the  working-man,  who  rose  from  the 

420 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

bench  as  they  passed,  and  shook  hands  with  his 
guest  on  the  doorstep. 

When  the  door  had  closed  upon  Mr.  Ware,  the 
priest  turned  to  the  man.  "  You  have  come  about 
those  frames,"  he  said.  "  If  you  will  come  upstairs, 
I  will  show  you  the  prints,  and  you  can  give  me  a 
notion  of  what  can  be  done  with  them.  I  rather 
fancy  the  idea  of  a  triptych  in  carved  old  English, 
if  you  can  manage  it." 

After  the  workman  had  gone  away,  Father  Forbes 
put  on  slippers  and  an  old  loose  soutane,  lighted  a 
cigar,  and,  pushing  an  easy-chair  over  to  the  reading 
lamp,  sat  down  with  a  book.  Then  something 
occurred  to  him,  and  he  touched  the  house-bell 
at  his  elbow. 

"  Maggie,"  he  said  gently,  when  the  housekeeper 
appeared  at  the  door,  "  I  will  have  the  coffee  and 
fine  champagne  up  here,  if  it  is  no  trouble.  And  — 
oh,  Maggie  —  I  was  compelled  this  evening  to  turn 
the  blameless  visit  of  the  framemaker  into  a  venial 
sin,  and  that  involves  a  needless  wear  and  tear  of 
conscience.  I  think  that  —  hereafter  —  you  under 
stand  ?  —  I  am  not  invariably  at  home  when  the 
Rev.  Mr.  W7are  does  me  the  honor  to  call." 


421 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

THAT  night  brought  the  first  frost  of  the  season 
worth  counting.  In  the  morning,  when  Theron 
came  downstairs,  his  casual  glance  through  the 
window  caught  a  desolate  picture  of  blackened 
dahlia  stalks  and  shrivelled  blooms.  The  gayety 
and  color  of  the  garden  were  gone,  and  in  their 
place  was  shabby  and  dishevelled  ruin.  He  flung 
the  sash  up  and  leaned  out.  The  nipping  autumn 
air  was  good  to  breathe.  He  looked  about  him, 
surveying  the  havoc  the  frost  had  wrought  among 
the  flowers,  and  smiled. 

At  breakfast  he  smiled  again,  —  a  mirthless  and 
calculated  smile.  "  I  see  that  Brother  Gorringe's 
flowers  have  come  to  grief  over  night,"  he  re 
marked. 

Alice  looked  at  him  before  she  spoke,  and  saw 
on  his  face  a  confirmation  of  the  hostile  hint  in 
his  voice.  She  nodded  in  a  constrained  way,  and 
said  nothing. 

"  Or  rather,  I  should  say,"  Theron  went  on, 
with  deliberate  words,  "  the  late  Brother  Gorringe's 
flowers." 

"How  do  you  mean  —  latel"  asked  his  wife, 
swiftly. 

422 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"Oh,  calm  yourself!"  replied  the  husband. 
"  He  is  not  dead.  He  has  only  intimated  to  me 
his  desire  to  sever  his  connection.  I  may  add 
tha<;  he  did  so  in  a  highly  offensive  manner." 

"  I  am  very  sorry,"  said  Alice,  in  a  low  tone, 
and  with  her  eyes  on  her  plate. 

"  I  took  it  for  granted  you  would  be  grieved  at 
his  backsliding,"  remarked  Theron,  making  his 
phrases  as  pointed  as  he  could.  "  He  was  such  a 
promising  probationer,  and  you  took  such  a  keen 
interest  in  his  spiritual  awakening.  But  the  frost 
has  nipped  his  zeal,  —  along  with  the  hundred  or 
more  dollars'  worth  of  flowers  by  which  he  testi 
fied  his  faith.  I  find  something  interesting  in  their 
having  been  blasted  simultaneously." 

Alice  dropped  all  pretence  of  interest  in  her 
breakfast.  With  a  flushed  face  and  lips  tightly 
compressed,  she  made  a  movement  as  if  to  rise 
from  her  chair.  Then,  changing  her  mind,  she 
sat  bolt  upright  and  faced  her  husband. 

"  I  think  we  had  better  have  this  out  right 
now,"  she  said,  in  a  voice  which  Theron  hardly 
recognized.  "  You  have  been  hinting  round  the 
subject  long  enough,  —  too  long.  There  are  some 
things  nobody  is  obliged  to  put  up  with,  and  this 
is  one  of  them.  You  will  oblige  me  by  saying  out 
in  so  many  words  what  it  is  you  are  driving  at." 

The  outburst  astounded  Theron.  He  laid  down 
his  knife  and  fork,  and  gazed  at  his  wife  in  frank 
surprise.  She  had  so  accustomed  him,  of  late,  to 

423 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

a  demeanor  almost  abject  in  its  depressed  docility 
that  he  had  quite  forgotten  the  Alice  of  the  old 
days,  when  she  had  spirit  and  courage  enough  for 
two,  and  a  notable  tongue  of  her  own.  The  flash 
in  her  eyes  and  the  lines  of  resolution  about  her 
mouth  and  chin  for  a  moment  daunted  him. 
Then  he  observed  by  a  flutter  of  the  frill  at  her 
wrist  that  she  was  trembling. 

"  I  am  sure  I  have  nothing  to  '  say  out  in  so 
many  words,'  as  you  put  it,"  he  replied,  forcing 
his  voice  into  cool,  impassive  tones.  "  I  merely 
commented  upon  a  coincidence,  that  was  all.  If, 
for  any  reason  under  the  sun,  the  subject  chances 
to  be  unpleasant  to  you,  I  have  no  earthly  desire 
to  pursue  it." 

"  But  I  insist  upon  having  it  pursued  !  "  returned 
Alice.  "  I  Ve  had  just  all  I  can  stand  of  your 
insinuations  and  innuendoes,  and  it 's  high  time  we 
had  some  plain  talk.  Ever  since  the  revival,  you 
have  been  dropping  sly,  underhand  hints  about 
Mr.  Gorringe  and  —  and  me.  Now  I  ask  you 
what  you  mean  by  it." 

Yes,  there  was  a  shake  in  her  voice,  and  he 
could  see  how  her  bosom  heaved  in  a  tremor  of 
nervousness.  It  was  easy  for  him  to  be  very  calm. 

"  It  is  you  who  introduce  these  astonishing 
suggestions,  not  I,"  he  replied  coldly.  "  It  is  you 
who  couple  your  name  with  his,  —  somewhat  to  my 
surprise,  I  admit,  —  but  let  me  suggest  that  we 
drop  the  subject.  You  are  excited  just  now,  and 

424 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

you  might  say  things  that  you  would  prefer  to  leave 
unsaid.  It  would  surely  be  better  for  all  concerned 
to  say  no  more  about  it." 

Alice,  staring  across  the  table  at  him  with  knitted 
brows,  emitted  a  sharp  little  snort  of  indignation. 
"  Well,  I  never  !  Theron,  I  would  n't  have  thought 
it  of  you  !  " 

"  There  are  so  many  things  you  would  n't  have 
thought,  on  such  a  variety  of  subjects,"  he  ob 
served,  with  a  show  of  resuming  his  breakfast. 
"  But  why  continue  ?  We  are  only  angering  each 
other." 

"  Never  mind  that,"  she  replied,  with  more  con 
trol  over  her  speech.  "  I  guess  things  have  come 
to  a  pass  where  a  little  anger  won't  do  any  harm. 
I  have  a  right  to  insist  on  knowing  what  you  mean 
by  your  insinuations." 

Theron  sighed.  "Why  will  you  keep  harping 
on  the  thing?"  he  asked  wearily.  "I  have  dis 
played  no  curiosity.  I  don't  ask  for  any  explana 
tions.  I  think  I  mentioned  that  the  man  had 
behaved  insultingly  to  me,  —  but  that  does  n't 
matter.  I  don't  bring  it  up  as  a  grievance.  I 
am  very  well  able  to  take  care  of  myself.  I  have 
no  wish  to  recur  to  the  incident  in  any  way.  So 
far  as  I  am  concerned,  the  topic  is  dismissed." 

"  Listen  to  me  ! "  broke  in  Alice,  with  eager 
gravity.  She  hesitated,  as  he  looked  up  with  a 
nod  of  attention,  and  reflected  as  well  as  she  was 
able  among  her  thoughts  for  a  minute  or  two. 

425 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"This  is  what  I  want  to  say  to  you.  Ever  since 
we  came  to  this  hateful  Octavius,  you  and  I  have 
been  drifting  apart,  —  or  no,  that  does  n't  express 
it,  —  simply  rushing  away  from  each  other.  It 
only  began  last  spring,  and  now  the  space  between 
us  is  so  wide  that  we  are  worse  than  complete 
strangers.  For  strangers  at  least  don't  hate  each 
other,  and  I  've  had  a  good  many  occasions  lately 
to  see  that  you  positively  do  hate  me  —  " 

"  What  grotesque  absurdity  !  "  interposed  Theron, 
impatiently. 

"  No,  it  is  n't  absurdity ;  it 's  gospel  truth,"  re 
torted  Alice.  "  And  —  don't  interrupt  me  —  there 
have  been  times,  too,  when  I  have  had  to  ask  my 
self  if  I  was  n't  getting  almost  to  hate  you  in  return. 
I  tell  you  this  frankly." 

"  Yes,  you  are  undoubtedly  frank,"  commented 
the  husband,  toying  with  his  teaspoon.  "  A  hyper 
critical  person  might  consider,  almost  too  frank." 

Alice  scanned  his  face  closely  while  he  spoke, 
and  held  her  breath  as  if  in  expectant  suspense. 
Her  countenance  clouded  once  more.  "  You  don't 
realize,  Theron,"  she  said  gravely;  "your  voice 
when  you  speak  to  me,  your  look,  your  manner, 
they  have  all  changed.  You  are  like  another  man, 
—  some  man  who  never  loved  me,  and  does  n't 
even  know  me,  much  less  like  me.  I  want  to 
know  what  the  end  of  it  is  to  be.  Up  to  the  time 
of  your  sickness  last  summer,  until  after  the 
Soulsbys  went  away,  I  did  n't  let  myself  get  down- 

426 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

right  discouraged.  It  seemed  too  monstrous  for 
belief  that  you  should  go  away  out  of  my  life  like 
that.  It  did  n't  seem  possible  that  God  could 
allow  such  a  thing.  It  came  to  me  that  I  had 
been  lax  in  my  Christian  life,  especially  in  my 
position  as  a  minister's  wife,  and  that  this  was  my 
punishment.  I  went  to  the  altar,  to  intercede  with 
Him,  and  to  try  to  loose  my  burden  at  His  feet. 
But  nothing  has  come  of  it.  I  got  no  help  from 
you." 

"Really,  Alice,"  broke  in  Theron,  "  I  explained 
over  and  over  again  to  you  how  preoccupied  I  was 
• — with  the  book  —  and  affairs  generally." 

"  I  got  no  assistance  from  Heaven  either,"  she 
went  on,  declining  the  diversion  he  offered.  "  I 
don't  want  to  talk  impiously,  but  if  there  is  a  God, 
he  has  forgotten  me,  his  poor  heart-broken  hand 
maiden." 

"You  are  talking  impiously,  Alice,"  observed 
her  husband.  "And  you  are  doing  me  cruel 
injustice,  into  the  bargain." 

"  I  only  wish  I  were  !  "  she  replied  \  "  I  only  wish 
to  God  I  were  ! " 

"  Well,  then,  accept  my  complete  assurance  that 
you  are,  —  that  your  whole  conception  of  me,  and 
of  what  you  are  pleased  to  describe  as  my  change 
toward  you,  is  an  entire  and  utter  mistake.  Of 
course,  the  married  state  is  no  more  exempt  from 
the  universal  law  of  growth,  development,  alter 
ation,  than  any  other  human  institution.  On  its 

427 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

spiritual  side,  of  course,  viewed  either  as  a  sacra 
ment,  or  as  —  " 

"Don't  let  us  go  into  that,"  interposed  Alice, 
abruptly.  "  In  fact,  there  is  no  good  in  talking 
any  more  at  all.  It  is  as  if  we  did  n't  speak  the 
same  language.  You  don't  understand  what  I 
say ;  it  makes  no  impression  upon  your  mind." 

"Quite  to  the  contrary,"  he  assured  her;  "I 
have  been  deeply  interested  and  concerned  in 
all  you  have  said.  I  think  you  are  laboring 
under  a  great  delusion,  and  I  have  tried  my 
best  to  convince  you  of  it ;  but  I  have  never 
heard  you  speak  more  intelligibly  or,  I  might  say, 
effectively." 

A  little  gleam  of  softness  stole  over  Alice's  face. 
"  If  you  only  gave  me  a  little  more  credit  for  in 
telligence,"  she  said,  "you  would  find  that  I  am 
not  such  a  blockhead  as  you  think  I  am." 

"  Come,  come  !  "  he  said,  with  a  smiling  show  of 
impatience.  "  You  really  must  n't  impute  things 
to  me  wholesale,  like  that." 

She  was  glad  to  answer  the  smile  in  kind.  "  No ; 
but  truly,"  she  pleaded,  "you  don't  realize  it,  but 
you  have  grown  into  a  way  of  treating  me  as  if  I 
had  absolutely  no  mind  at  all." 

"  You  have  a  very  admirable  mind,"  he  re 
sponded,  and  took  up  his  teaspoon  again.  She 
reached  for  his  cup,  and  poured  out  hot  coffee  for 
him.  An  almost  cheerful  spirit  had  suddenly 
descended  upon  the  breakfast  table. 

428 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"And  now  let  me  say  the  thing  I  have  been 
aching  to  say  for  months,"  she  began,  in  a  less 
burdened  voice. 

He  lifted  his  brows.  "  Have  n't  things  been 
discussed  pretty  fully  already?  "  he  asked. 

The  doubtful,  harassed  expression  clouded  upon 
her  face  at  his  words,  and  she  paused.  "  No," 
she  said  resolutely,  after  an  instant's  reflection ; 
"  it  is  my  duty  to  discuss  this,  too.  It  is  a  misun 
derstanding  all  round.  You  remember  that  I  told 
you  Mr.  Gorringe  had  given  me  some  plants,  which 
he  got  from  some  garden  or  other?  " 

"  If  you  really  wish  to  go  on  with  the  subject  — 
yes  —  I  have  a  recollection  of  that  particular  false 
hood  of  his." 

"  He  did  it  with  the  kindest  and  friendliest 
motives  in  the  world  !  "  protested  Alice.  "  He 
saw  how  down-in-the-mouth  and  moping  I  was 
here,  among  these  strangers,  —  and  I  really  was 
getting  quite  peaked  and  run-down,  —  and  he  said 
I  stayed  indoors  too  much,  and  it  would  do  me  all 
sorts  of  good  to  work  in  the  garden,  and  he  would 
send  me  some  plants.  The  next  I  knew,  here  they 
were,  with  a  book  about  mixing  soils  and  planting, 
and  so  on.  When  I  saw  him  next,  and  thanked 
him,  I  suppose  I  showed  some  apprehension  about 
his  having  laid  out  money  on  them,  and  l)e,  just  to 
ease  my  mind,  invented  the  story  about  his  getting 
them  for  nothing.  When  I  found  out  the  truth  — 
I  got  it  out  of  that  boy,  Harvey  Semple  —  he  ad- 

429 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

mitted  it  quite  frankly,  —  said  he  was  wrong  to 
deceive  me." 

"This  was  in  the  fine  first  fervor  of  his  term  of 
probation,  I  suppose,"  put  in  Theron.  He  made 
no  effort  to  dissemble  the  sneer  in  his  voice. 

"  Well,"  answered  Alice,  with  a  touch  of 
acerbity,  "  I  have  told  you  now,  and  it  is  off  my 
mind.  There  never  would  have  been  the  slightest 
concealment  about  it,  if  you  had  n't  begun  by 
keeping  me  at  arm's  length,  and  making  it  next 
door  to  impossible  to  speak  to  you  at  all,  and 
if—" 

"  And  if  he  had  n't  lied."  Theron,  as  he  finished 
her  sentence  for  her,  rose  from  the  table.  Dallying 
for  a  brief  moment  by  his  chair,  there  seemed  the 
magnetic  premonition  in  the  air  of  some  further 
and  kindlier  word.  Then  he  turned  and  walked 
sedately  into  the  next  room,  and  closed  the  door 
behind  him.  The  talk  was  finished ;  and  Alice,  left 
alone,  passed  the  knuckle  of  her  thumb  over  one 
swimming  eye  and  then  the  other,  and  bit  her 
lips  and  swallowed  down  the  sob  that  rose  in 
her  throat. 


430 


CHAPTER  XXVIII 

IT  was  early  afternoon  when  Theron  walked  out 
of  his  yard,  bestowing  no  glance  upon  the  withered 
and  tarnished  show  of  the  garden,  and  started  with 
a  definite  step  down  the  street.  The  tendency  to 
ruminative  loitering,  which  those  who  saw  him 
abroad  always  associated  with  his  tall,  spare  figure, 
was  not  suggested  to-day.  He  moved  forward 
like  a  man  with  a  purpose. 

All  the  forenoon  in  the  seclusion  of  the  sitting- 
room,  with  a  book  opened  before  him,  he  had 
been  thinking  hard.  It  was  not  the  talk  with 
Alice  that  occupied  his  thoughts.  That  rose  in 
his  mind  from  time  to  time,  only  as  a  disagreeable 
blur,  and  he  refused  to  dwell  upon  it.  It  was 
nothing  to  him,  he  said  to  himself,  what  Gorringe's 
motives  in  lying  had  been.  As  for  Alice,  he  hard 
ened  his  heart  against  her.  Just  now  it  was  her 
mood  to  try  and  make  up  to  him.  But  it  had 
been  something  different  yesterday,  and  who  could 
say  what  it  would  be  to-morrow?  He  really  had 
passed  the  limit  of  patience  with  her  shifting 
emotional  vagaries,  now  lurching  in  this  direction, 
now  in  that.  She  had  had  her  chance  to  main- 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

tain  a  hold  upon  his  interest  and  imagination,  and 
had  let  it  slip.  These  were  the  accidents  of  life, 
the  inevitable  harsh  happenings  in  the  great  tragedy 
of  Nature.  They  could  not  be  helped,  and  there 
was  nothing  more  to  be  said. 

He  had  bestowed  much  more  attention  upon 
what  the  priest  had  said  the  previous  evening.  He 
passed  in  review  all  the  glowing  tributes  Father 
Forbes  had  paid  to  Celia.  They  warmed  his 
senses  as  he  recalled  them,  but  they  also,  in  a 
curious,  indefinite  way,  caused  him  uneasiness. 
There  had  been  a  personal  fervor  about  them 
which  was  something  more  than  priestly.  He 
remembered  how  the  priest  had  turned  pale  and 
faltered  when  the  question  whether  Celia  would 
escape  the  general  doom  of  her  family  came  up. 
It  was  not  a  merely  pastoral  agitation  that,  he  felt 
sure. 

A  hundred  obscure  hints,  doubts,  stray  little 
suspicions,  crowded  upward  together  in  his  thoughts. 
It  became  apparent  to  him  now  that  from  the  out 
set  he  had  been  conscious  of  something  queer,  — 
yes,  from  that  very  first  day  when  he  saw  the 
priest  and  Celia  together,  and  noted  their  glance 
of  recognition  inside  the  house  of  death.  He 
realized  now,  upon  reflection,  that  the  tone  of 
other  people,  his  own  parishioners  and  his  casual 
acquaintances  in  Octavius  alike,  had  always  had 
a  certain  note  of  reservation  in  it  when  it  touched 
upon  Miss  Madden.  Her  running  in  and  out  of 

43  2 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

the  pastorate  at  all  hours,  the  way  the  priest  patted 
her  on  the  shoulder  before  others,  the  obvious 
dislike  the  priest's  ugly  old  housekeeper  bore  her, 
the  astonishing  freedom  of  their  talk  with  each 
other,  —  these  dark  memories  loomed  forth  out  of 
a  mass  of  sinister  conjecture. 

He  could  bear  the  uncertainty  no  longer.  Was 
it  indeed  not  entirely  his  own  fault  that  it  had 
existed  thus  long?  No  man  with  the  spirit  of  a 
mouse  would  have  shilly-shallied  in  this  preposter 
ous  fashion,  week  after  week,  with  the  fever  of  a 
beautiful  woman's  kiss  in  his  blood,  and  the  woman 
herself  living  only  round  the  corner.  The  whole 
world  had  been  as  good  as  offered  to  him,  —  a 
bewildering  world  of  wealth  and  beauty  and  spirit 
ual  exaltation  and  love,  —  and  he,  like  a  weak  fool, 
had  waited  for  it  to  be  brought  to  him  on  a  salver, 
as  it  were,  and  actually  forced  upon  his  acceptance  ! 
"  That  is  my  failing,"  he  reflected  ;  "  these  miser 
able  ecclesiastical  bandages  of  mine  have  dwarfed 
my  manly  side.  The  meanest  of  Thurston's  clerks 
would  have  shown  a  more  adventurous  spirit  and 
a  bolder  nerve.  If  I  do  not  act  at  once,  with 
courage  and  resolution,  everything  will  be  lost. 
Already  she  must  think  me  unworthy  of  the  honor 
it  was  in  her  sweet  will  to  bestowl"  Then  he 
remembered  that  she  was  now  always  at  home. 
"  Not  another  hour  of  foolish  indecision  !  "  he 
whispered  to  himself.  "  I  will  put  my  destiny  to 
the  test.  I  will  see  her  to-day  ! " 
*8  433 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

A  middle-aged,  plain-faced  servant  answered  his 
ring  at  the  door-bell  of  the  Madden  mansion.  She 
was  palpably  Irish,  and  looked  at  him  with  a 
saddened  preoccupation  in  her  gray  eyes,  holding 
the  door  only  a  little  ajar. 

Theron  had  got  out  one  of  his  cards.  "  I  wish 
to  make  inquiry  about  young  Mr.  Madden,  —  Mr. 
Michael  Madden,"  he  said,  holding  the  card  forth 
tentatively.  "  I  have  only  just  heard  of  his  illness, 
and  it  has  been  a  great  grief  to  me." 

"  He  is  no  better,"  answered  the  woman,  briefly. 

"  I  am  the  Rev.  Mr.  Ware,"  he  went  on,  "  and 
you  may  say  that,  if  he  is  well  enough,  I  should  be 
glad  to  see  him." 

The  servant  peered  out  at  him  with  a  suddenly 
altered  expression,  then  shook  her  head.  "  I  don't 
think  he  would  be  wishing  to  see  you"  she  replied. 
It  was  evident  from  her  tone  that  she  suspected 
the  visitor's  intentions. 

Theron  smiled  in  spite  of  himself.  "  I  have  not 
come  as  a  clergyman,"  he  explained,  "  but  as  a 
friend  of  the  family.  If  you  will  tell  Miss  Madden 
that  I  am  here,  it  will  do  just  as  well.  Yes,  we 
won't  bother  him.  If  you  will  kindly  hand  my 
card  to  his  sister." 

When  the  domestic  turned  at  this  and  went  in, 
Theron  felt  like  throwing  his  hat  in  the  air,  there 
where  he  stood.  The  woman's  churlish  sectarian 
prejudices  had  played  ideally  into  his  hands.  In 
no  other  imaginable  way  could  he  have  asked  for 

434 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Celia  so  naturally.  He  wondered  a  little  that  a 
servant  at  such  a  grand  house  as  this  should  leave 
callers  standing  on  the  doorstep.  Still  more  he 
wondered  what  he  should  say  to  the  lady  of  his 
dreams  when  he  came  into  her  presence. 

"  Will  you  please  to  walk  this  way  ? "  The 
woman  had  returned.  She  closed  the  door  noise 
lessly  behind  him,  and  led  the  way,  not  up  the  sump 
tuous  staircase,  as  Theron  had  expected,  but  along 
through  the  broad  hall,  past  several  large  doors,  to 
a  small  curtained  archway  at  the  end.  She  pushed 
aside  this  curtain,  and  Theron  found  himself  in  a 
sort  of  conservatory,  full  of  the  hot,  vague  light 
of  sunshine  falling  through  ground-glass.  The  air 
was  moist  and  close,  and  heavy  with  the  smell  of 
verdure  and  wet  earth.  A  tall  bank  of  palms, 
with  ferns  sprawling  at  their  base,  reared  itself 
directly  in  front  of  him.  The  floor  was  of  mosaic, 
and  he  saw  now  that  there  were  rugs  upon  it, 
and  that  there  were  chairs  and  sofas,  and  other 
signs  of  habitation.  It  was,  indeed,  only  half  a 
greenhouse,  for  the  lower  part  of  it  was  in  rose 
wood  panels,  with  floral  paintings  on  them,  like 
a  room 

Moving  to  one  side  of  the  barrier  of  palms,  he 
discovered,  to  his  great  surprise,  the  figure  of 
Michael,  sitting  propped  up  with  pillows  in  a  huge 
easy-chair.  The  sick  man  was  looking  at  him 
with  big,  gravely  intent  eyes.  His  face  did  not 
show  as  much  change  as  Theron  had  in  fancy 

435 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

pictured.  It  had  seemed  almost  as  bony  and 
cadaverous  on  the  day  of  the  picnic.  The  hands 
spread  out  on  the  chair-arms  were  very  white  and 
thin,  though,  and  the  gaze  in  the  blue  eyes  had  a 
spectral  quality  which  disturbed  him. 

Michael  raised  his  right  hand,  and  Theron,  step 
ping  forward,  took  it  limply  in  his  for  an  instant. 
Then  he  laid  it  down  again.  The  touch  of  people 
about  to  die  had  always  been  repugnant  to  him. 
He  could  feel  on  his  own  warm  palm  the  very 
damp  of  the  grave. 

"  I  only  heard  from  Father  Forbes  last  evening 
of  your  —  your  ill-health,"  he  said,  somewhat 
hesitatingly.  He  seated  himself  on  a  bench 
beneath  the  palms,  facing  the  invalid,  but  still 
holding  his  hat.  "  I  hope  very  sincerely  that  you 
will  soon  be  all  right  again." 

"  My  sister  is  lying  down  in  her  room,"  answered 
Michael.  He  had  not  once  taken  his  sombre  and 
embarrassing  gaze  from  the  other's  face.  The 
voice  in  which  he  uttered  this  uncalled-for  remark 
was  thin  in  fibre,  cold  and  impassive.  It  fell  upon 
Theron's  ears  with  a  suggestion  of  hidden  meaning. 
He  looked  uneasily  into  Michael's  eyes,  and  then 
away  again.  They  seemed  to  be  looking  straight 
through  him,  and  there  was  no  shirking  the  sensa 
tion  that  they  saw  and  comprehended  things  with 
an  unnatural  prescience. 

"I  hope  she  is  feeling  better,"  Theron  found 
himself  saying.  "  Father  Forbes  mentioned  that 

436 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

she  was  a  little  under  the  weather.     I  dined  with 
him  last  night." 

"I  am  giad  that  you  came,"  said  Michael,  after 
a  little  pause.  His  earnest,  unblinking  eyes  seemed 
to  supplement  his  tongue  with  speech  of  their  own. 
"  I  do  be  thinking  a  great  deal  about  you.  I  have 
matters  to  speak  of  to  you,  now  that  you  are 
here." 

Theron  bowed  his  head  gently,  in  token  of 
grateful  attention.  He  tried  the  experiment  of 
looking  away  from  Michael,  but  his  glance  went 
back  again  irresistibly,  and  fastened  itself  upon  the 
sick  man's  gaze,  and  clung  there. 

"  I  am  next  door  to  a  dead  man,"  he  went  on, 
paying  no  heed  to  the  other's  deprecatory  gesture. 
"  It  is  not  years  or  months  with  me,  but  weeks. 
Then  I  go  away  to  stand  up  for  judgment  on  my 
sins,  and  if  it  is  His  merciful  will,  I  shall  see  God. 
So  I  say  my  good-byes  now,  and  so  you  will  let  me 
speak  plainly,  and  not  think  ill  of  what  I  say.  You 
are  much  changed,  Mr.  Ware,  since  you  came  to 
Octavius,  and  it  is  not  a  change  for  the  good." 

Theron  lifted  his  brows  in  unaffected  surprise, 
and  put  inquiry  into  his  glance. 

"  I  don't  know  if  Protestants  will  be  saved,  in 
God's  good  time,  or  not,"  continued  Michael. 
"  I  find  there  are  different  opinions  among  the 
clergy  about  that,  and  of  course  it  is  not  for  me, 
only  a  plain  mechanic,  to  be  sure  where  learned 
and  pious  scholars  are  in  doubt.  But  I  am  sure 

437 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

about  one  thing.  Those  Protestants,  and  others 
too,  mind  you,  who  profess  and  preach  good 
deeds,  and  themselves  do  bad  deeds,  —  they  will 
never  be  saved.  They  will  have  no  chance  at 
all  to  escape  hell-fire." 

"  I  think  we  are  all  agreed  upon  that,  Mr. 
Madden,"  said  Theron,  with  surface  suavity. 

"Then  I  say  to  you,  Mr.  Ware,  you  are  your 
self  in  a  bad  path.  Take  the  warning  of  a  dying 
man,  sir,  and  turn  from  it !  " 

The  impulse  to  smile  tugged  at  Theron' s  facial 
muscles.  This  was  really  too  droll.  He  looked 
up  at  the  ceiling,  the  while  he  forced  his  counte 
nance  into  a  polite  composure,  then  turned  again 
to  Michael,  with  some  conciliatory  commonplace 
ready  for  utterance.  But  he  said  nothing,  and  all 
suggestion  of  levity  left  his  mind,  under  the  search 
ing  inspection  bent  upon  him  by  the  young  man's 
hollow  eyes.  What  did  Michael  suspect?  What 
did  he  know?  What  was  he  hinting  at,  in  this 
strange  talk  of  his  ? 

"  I  saw  you  often  on  the  street  when  first  you 
came  here,"  continued  Michael.  "  I  knew  the  man 
who  was  here  before  you,  —  that  is,  by  sight,  — 
and  he  was  not  a  good  man.  But  your  face,  when 
you  came,  pleased  me.  I  liked  to  look  at  you. 
I  was  tormented  just  then,  do  you  see,  that  so 
many  decent,  kindly  people,  old  school-mates  and 
friends  and  neighbors  of  mine,  —  and,  for  that 
matter,  others  all  over  the  country  —  must  lose 

438 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

their  souls  because  they  were  Protestants.  All  my 
boyhood  and  young  manhood,  that  thought  took 
the  joy  out  of  me.  Sometimes  I  use  n't  to  sleep 
a  whole  night  long,  for  thinking  that  some  lad  I 
had  been  playing  with,  perhaps  in  his  own  house, 
that  very  day,  would  be  taken  when  he  died,  and 
his  mother  too,  when  she  died,  and  thrown  into 
the  flames  of  hell  for  all  eternity.  It  made  me 
so  unhappy  that  finally  I  would  n't  go  to  any 
Protestant  boy's  house,  and  have  his  mother  be 
nice  to  me,  and  give  me  cake  and  apples,  —  and  me 
thinking  all  the  while  that  they  were  bound  to  be 
damned,  no  matter  how  good  they  were  to  me." 

The  primitive  humanity  of  this  touched  Theron, 
and  he  nodded  approbation  with  a  tender  smile  in 
his  eyes,  forgetting  for  the  moment  that  a  per 
sonal  application  of  the  monologue  had  been 
hinted  at. 

"  But  then  later,  as  I  grew  up,"  the  sick  man 
went  on,  "  I  learned  that  it  was  not  altogether 
certain.  Some  of  the  authorities,  I  found,  main 
tained  that  it  was  doubtful,  and  some  said  openly 
that  there  must  be  salvation  possible  for  good 
people  who  lived  in  ignorance  of  the  truth 
through  no  fault  of  their  own.  Then  I  had  hope 
one  day,  and  no  hope  the  next,  and  as  I  did  my 
work  I  thought  it  over,  and  in  the  evenings  my 
father  and  I  talked  it  over,  and  we  settled  nothing 
of  it  at  all.  Of  course,  how  could  we  ?  " 

"  Did  you  ever  discuss  the  question  with  your 

439 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

sister?  "  it  occurred  suddenly  to  Theron  to  inter 
pose.  He  was  conscious  of  some  daring  in  doing 
so,  and  he  fancied  that  Michael's  drawn  face 
clouded  a  little  at  his  words. 

"  My  sister  is  no  theologian,"  he  answered 
briefly.  "  Women  have  no  call  to  meddle  with  such 
matters.  But  I  was  saying  —  it  was  in  the  middle 
of  these  doubtings  of  mine  that  you  came  here  to 
Octavius,  and  I  noticed  you  on  the  streets,  and 
once  in  the  evening  —  I  made  no  secret  of  it  to 
my  people  —  I  sat  in  the  back  of  your  church  and 
heard  you  preach.  As  I  say,  I  liked  you.  It  was 
your  face,  and  what  I  thought  it  showed  of  the 
man  underneath  it,  that  helped  settle  my  mind 
more  than  anything  else.  I  said  to  myself: 
'  Here  is  a  young  man,  only  about  my  own  age, 
and  he  has  education  and  talents,  and  he  does  not 
seek  to  make  money  for  himself,  or  a  great  name, 
but  he  is  content  to  live  humbly  on  the  salary  of  a 
book-keeper,  and  devote  all  his  time  to  prayer  and 
the  meditation  of  his  religion,  and  preaching,  and 
visiting  the  sick  and  the  poor,  and  comforting 
them.  His  very  face  is  a  pleasure  and  a  help  for 
those  in  suffering  and  trouble  to  look  at.  The 
very  sight  of  it  makes  one  believe  in  pure  thoughts 
and  merciful  deeds.  I  will  not  credit  it  that  God 
intends  damning  such  a  man  as  that,  or  any  like 
him  ! '  " 

Theron  bowed,  with  a  slow,  hesitating  gravity  of 
manner,  and  deep,  not  wholly  complacent,  attention 

440 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

on  his  face.     Evidently  all  this  was  by  way  of  prep 
aration  for  something  unpleasant. 

"That  was  only  last  spring,"  said  Michael.  His 
tired  voice  sank  for  a  sentence  or  two  into  a  medi 
tative  half-whisper.  "And  it  was  my  last  spring  of 
all.  I  shall  not  be  growing  weak  any  more,  or 
drawing  hard  breaths,  when  the  first  warm  weather 
comes.  It  will  be  one  season  to  me  hereafter,  al 
ways  the  same."  He  lifted  his  voice  with  percep 
tible  effort.  "  I  am  talking  too  much.  The  rest  I 
can  say  in  a  word.  Only  half  a  year  has  gone  by, 
and  you  have  another  face  on  you  entirely.  I  had 
noticed  the  small  changes  before,  one  by  one.  I 
saw  the  great  change,  all  of  a  sudden,  the  day  of 
the  picnic.  I  see  it  a  hundred  times  more  now,  as 
you  sit  there.  If  it  seemed  to  me  like  the  face  of 
a  saint  before,  it  is  more  like  the  face  of  a  bar 
keeper  now  ! " 

This  was  quite  too  much.  Theron  rose,  flushed 
to  the  temples,  and  scowled  down  at  the  helpless 
man  in  the  chair.  He  swallowed  the  sharp  words 
which  came  uppermost,  and  bit  and  moistened  his 
lips  as  he  forced  himself  to  remember  that  this  was 
a  dying  man,  and  Celia's  brother,  to  whom  she  was 
devoted,  and  whom  he  himself  felt  he  wanted  to  be 
very  fond  of.  He  got  the  shadow  of  a  smile  on  to 
his  countenance. 

"  I  fear  you  have  tired  yourself  unduly,"  he  said, 
in  as  non-contentious  a  tone  as  he  could  manage. 
He  even  contrived  a  little  deprecatory  laugh.  "  I 

441 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

am  afraid  your  real  quarrel  is  with  the  air  of  Octa- 
vius.  It  agrees  with  me  so  wonderfully,  —  I  am 
getting  as  fat  as  a  seal.  But  I  do  hope  I  am  not 
paying  for  it  by  such  a  wholesale  deterioration  in 
side.  If  my  own  opinion  could  be  of  any  value,  I 
should  assure  you  that  I  feel  myself  an  infinitely 
better  and  broader  and  stronger  man  than  I  was 
when  I  came  here." 

Michael  shook  his  head  dogmatically.  "  That  is 
the  greatest  pity  of  all,"  he  said,  with  renewed  earn 
estness.  "  You  are  entirely  deceived  about  your 
self.  You  do  not  at  all  realize  how  you  have  altered 
your  direction,  or  where  you  are  going.  It  was  a 
great  misfortune  for  you,  sir,  that  you  did  not  keep 
among  your  own  people.  That  poor  half-brother 
of  mine,  though  the  drink  was  in  him  when  he  said 
that  same  to  you,  never  spoke  a  truer  word.  Keep 
among  your  own  people,  Mr.  Ware  !  When  you  go 
among  others  —  you  know  what  I  mean  —  you  have 
no  proper  understanding  of  what  their  sayings  and 
doings  really  mean.  You  do  not  realize  that  they 
are  held  up  by  the  power  of  the  true  Church,  as  a 
little  child  learning  to  walk  is  held  up  with  a  belt 
by  its  nurse.  They  can  say  and  do  things,  and  no 
harm  at  all  come  to  them,  which  would  mean  de 
struction  to  you,  because  they  have  help,  and  you 
are  walking  alone.  And  so  be  said  by  me,  Mr. 
Ware  !  Go  back  to  the  way  you  were  brought  up 
in,  and  leave  alone  the  people  whose  ways  are 
different  from  yours.  You  are  a  married  man,  and 

442 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

you  are  the  preacher  of  a  religion,  such  as  it  is. 
There  can  be  nothing  better  for  you  than  to  go  and 
strive  to  be  a  good  husband,  and  to  set  a  good 
example  to  the  people  of  your  Church,  who  look  up 
to  you  —  and  mix  yourself  up  no  more  with  outside 
people  and  outside  notions  that  only  do  you  mis 
chief.  And  that  is  what  I  wanted  to  say  to  you." 

Theron  took  up  his  hat.  "  I  take  in  all  kindness 
what  you  have  felt  it  your  duty  to  say  to  me,  Mr. 
Madden,"  he  said.  "  I  am  not  sure  that  I  have 
altogether  followed  you,  but  I  am  very  sure  you 
mean  it  well." 

"  I  mean  well  by  you,"  replied  Michael,  wearily 
moving  his  head  on  the  pillow,  and  speaking  in  an 
undertone  of  languor  and  pain,  "  and  I  mean  well 
by  others,  that  are  nearer  to  me,  and  that  I  have  a 
right  to  care  more  about.  When  a  man  lies  by  the 
side  of  his  open  grave,  he  does  not  be  meaning  ill 
to  any  human  soul." 

"  Yes  —  thanks  —  quite  so  !  "  faltered  Theron. 
He  dallied  for  an  instant  with  the  temptation  to 
seek  some  further  explanation,  but  the  sight  of 
Michael's  half- closed  eyes  and  worn-out  expression 
decided  him  against  it.  It  did  not  seem  to  be 
expected,  either,  that  he  should  shake  hands,  and 
with  a  few  perfunctory  words  of  hope  for  the  in 
valid's  recovery,  which  fell  with  a  jarring  note  of 
falsehood  upon  his  own  ears,  he  turned  and  left  the 
room.  As  he  did  so,  Michael  touched  a  bell  on 
the  table  beside  him. 

443 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Theron  drew  a  long  breath  in  the  hall,  as  the 
curtain  fell  behind  him.  It  was  an  immense  relief 
to  escape  from  the  oppressive  humidity  and  heat  of 
the  flower-room,  and  from  that  ridiculous  bore  of 
a  Michael  as  well. 

The  middle-aged,  grave-faced  servant,  warned  by 
the  bell,  stood  waiting  to  conduct  him  to  the  door. 

"  I  am  sorry  to  have  missed  Miss  Madden,"  he 
said  to  her.  "  She  must  be  quite  worn  out.  Per 
haps  later  in  the  day  —  " 

"  She  will  not  be  seeing  anybody  to-day,"  re 
turned  the  woman.  "  She  is  going  to  New  York 
this  evening,  and  she  is  taking  some  rest  against 
the  journey." 

"  Will  she  be  away  long?"  he  asked  mechani 
cally.  The  servant's  answer,  "  I  have  no  idea," 
hardly  penetrated  his  consciousness  at  all. 

He  moved  down  the  steps,  and  along  the  gravel 
to  the  street,  in  a  maze  of  mental  confusion.  When 
he  reached  the  sidewalk,  under  the  familiar  elms, 
he  paused,  and  made  a  definite  effort  to  pull  his 
thoughts  together,  and  take  stock  of  what  had 
happened,  of  what  was  going  to  happen ;  but  the 
thing  baffled  him.  It  was  as  if  some  drug  had 
stupefied  his  faculties. 

He  began  to  walk,  and  gradually  saw  that  what 
he  was  thinking  about  was  the  fact  of  Celia's  de 
parture  for  New  York  that  evening.  He  stared  at 
this  fact,  at  first  in  its  nakedness,  then  clothed  with 
reassuring  suggestions  that  this  was  no  doubt  a  trip 

444 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

she  very  often  made.  There  was  a  blind  sense  of 
comfort  in  this  idea,  and  he  rested  himself  upon  it. 
Yes,  of  course,  she  travelled  a  great  deal.  New 
York  must  be  as  familiar  to  her  as  Octavius  was  to 
him.  Her  going  there  now  was  quite  a  matter  of 
course,  —  the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world. 

Then  there  burst  suddenly  uppermost  in  his 
mind  the  other  fact,  —  that  Father  Forbes  was  also 
going  to  New  York  that  evening.  The  two  things 
spindled  upward,  side  by  side,  yet  separately,  in  his 
mental  vision ;  then  they  twisted  and  twined 
themselves  together.  He  followed  their  convolu 
tions  miserably,  walking  as  if  his  eyes  were  shut. 

In  slow  fashion  matters  defined  and  arranged 
themselves  before  him.  The  process  of  tracing 
their  sequence  was  all  torture,  but  there  was  no 
possibility,  no  notion,  of  shirking  any  detail  of  the 
pain.  The  priest  had  spoken  of  his  efforts  to  per 
suade  Celia  to  go  away  for  a  few  days,  for  rest  and 
change  of  air  and  scene.  He  must  have  known 
only  too  well  that  she  was  going,  but  of  that  he 
had  been  careful  to  drop  no  hint.  The  possibility 
of  accident  was  too  slight  to  be  worth  considering. 
People  on  such  intimate  terms  as  Celia  and  the 
priest  —  people  with  such  facilities  for  seeing  each 
other  whenever  they  desired  —  did  not  find  them 
selves  on  the  same  train  of  cars,  with  the  same 
long  journey  in  view,  by  mere  chance. 

Theron  walked  until  dusk  began  to  close  in 
upon  the  autumn  day.  It  grew  colder,  as  he 

445 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

turned  his  face  homeward.  He  wondered  if  it 
would  freeze  again  over-night,  and  then  remem 
bered  the  shrivelled  flowers  in  his  wife's  garden. 
For  a  moment  they  shaped  themselves  in  a  picture 
before  his  mind's  eye ;  he  saw  their  blackened 
foliage,  their  sicklied,  drooping  stalks,  and  wilted 
blooms,  and  as  he  looked,  they  restored  themselves 
to  the  vigor  and  grace  and  richness  of  color  of 
summer-time,  as  vividly  as  if  they  had  been  painted 
on  a  canvas.  Or  no,  the  picture  he  stared  at  was 
not  on  canvas,  but  on  the  glossy,  varnished  panel 
of  a  luxurious  sleeping-car.  He  shook  his  head 
angrily  and  blinked  his  eyes  again  and  again,  to 
prevent  their  seeing,  seated  together  in  the  open 
window  above  this  panel,  the  two  people  he  knew 
were  there,  gloved  and  habited  for  the  night's 
journey,  waiting  for  the  train  to  start. 

•  •••»••• 

"Very  much  to  my  surprise,"  he  found  himself 
saying  to  Alice,  watching  her  nervously  as  she  laid 
the  supper-table,  "  I  find  I  must  go  to  Albany  to 
night.  That  is,  it  isn't  absolutely  necessary,  for 
that  matter,  but  I  think  it  may  easily  turn  out  to 
be  greatly  to  my  advantage  to  go.  Something  has 
arisen  —  I  can't  speak  about  it  as  yet  —  but  the 
sooner  I  see  the  Bishop  about  it  the  better. 
Things  like  that  occur  in  a  man's  life,  where 
boldly  striking  out  a  line  of  action,  and  following 
it  up  without  an  instant's  delay,  may  make  all 
the  difference  in  the  world  to  him.  To-morrow 

446 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

it  might  be  too  late ;  and,  besides,  I  can  be  home 
the  sooner  again." 

Alice's  face  showed  surprise,  but  no  trace  of 
suspicion.  She  spoke  with  studied  amiability  dur 
ing  the  meal,  and  deferred  with  such  unexpected 
tact  to  his  implied  desire  not  to  be  questioned  as 
to  the  mysterious  motives  of  the  journey,  that  his 
mood  instinctively  softened  and  warmed  toward 
her,  as  they  finished  supper. 

He  smiled  a  little.  "  I  do  hope  I  sha'n't  have 
to  go  on  to-morrow  to  New  York;  but  these 
Bishops  of  ours  are  such  gad-abouts  one  never 
knows  where  to  catch  them.  As  like  as  not 
Sanderson  may  be  down  in  New  York,  on  Book- 
Concern  business  or  something ;  and  if  he  is,  I 
shall  have  to  chase  him  up.  But,  after  all,  perhaps 
the  trip  will  do  me  good,  —  the  change  of  air  and 
scene,  you  know." 

"  I  'm  sure  I  hope  so,"  said  Alice,  honestly 
enough.  "  If  you  do  go  on  to  New  York,  I  sup 
pose  you  '11  go  by  the  river- boat.  Everybody  talks 
so  much  of  that  beautiful  sail  down  the  Hudson." 

"That 's  an  idea  !  "  exclaimed  Theron,  welcom 
ing  it  with  enthusiasm.  "  It  had  n't  occurred  to 
me.  If  I  do  have  to  go,  and  it  is  as  lovely  as  they 
make  out,  the  next  time  I  promise  I  won't  go  with 
out  you,  my  girl.  I  have  been  rather  out  of  sorts 
lately,"  he  continued.  "When  I  come  back,  I 
daresay  I  shall  be  feeling  better,  more  like  my  old 
self.  Then  I  'm  going  to  try,  Alice,  to  be  nicer  to 

447 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

you  than  I  have  been  of  late.  I  'm  afraid  there 
was  only  too  much  truth  in  what  you  said  this 
morning." 

"  Never  mind  what  I  said  this  morning  —  or  any 
other  time,"  broke  in  Alice,  softly.  "  Don't  ever 
remember  it  again,  Theron,  if  only  —  only  —  " 

He  rose  as  she  spoke,  moved  round  the  table  to 
where  she  sat,  and,  bending  over  her,  stopped  the 
faltering  sentence  with  a  kiss.  When  was  it,  he 
wondered,  that  he  had  last  kissed  her?  It  seemed 
years,  ages,  ago. 

An  hour  later,  with  hat  and  overcoat  on,  and  his 
valise  in  his  hand,  he  stood  on  the  doorstep  of  the 
parsonage,  and  kissed  her  once  more  before  he 
turned  and  descended  into  the  darkness.  He  felt 
like  whistling  as  his  feet  sounded  firmly  on  the 
plank  sidewalk  beyond  the  gate.  It  seemed  as  if 
he  had  never  been  in  such  capital  good  spirits 
before  in  his  life. 


448 


CHAPTER  XXIX 

THE  train  was  at  a  standstill  somewhere,  and  the 
dull,  ashen  beginnings  of  daylight  had  made  a  first 
feeble  start  toward  effacing  the  lamps  in  the  car-roof, 
when  the  new  day  opened  for  Theron.  A  man  who 
had  just  come  in  stopped  at  the  seat  upon  which  he 
had  been  stretched  through  the  night,  and,  tapping 
him  brusquely  on  the  knee,  said,  "  I  'm  afraid  I 
must  trouble  you,  sir."  After  a  moment  of  sleep- 
burdened  confusion,  he  sat  up,  and  the  man  took 
the  other  half  of  the  seat  and  opened  a  newspaper, 
still  damp  from  the  press.  It  was  morning,  then. 

Theron  rubbed  a  clear  space  upon  the  clouded 
window  with  his  thumb,  and  looked  out.  There 
was  nothing  to  be  seen  but  a  broad  stretch  of 
tracks,  and  beyond  this  the  shadowed  outlines  of 
wagons  and  machinery  in  a  yard,  with  a  back 
ground  of  factory  buildings. 

The  atmosphere  in  the  car  was  vile  beyond 
belief.  He  thought  of  opening  the  window,  but 
feared  that  the  peremptory-looking  man  with  the 
paper,  who  had  wakened  him  and  made  him  sit 
up,  might  object.  They  were  the  only  people  in 
the  car  who  were  sitting  up.  Backwards  and  for 
wards,  on  either  side  of  the  narrow  aisle,  the  dim 
29  449 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

light  disclosed  recumbent  forms,  curled  uncomfort 
ably  into  corners,  or  sprawling  at  difficult  angles 
which  involved  the  least  interference  with  one 
another.  Here  and  there  an  upturned  face  gave  a 
livid  patch  of  surface  for  the  mingled  play  of  the 
gray  dawn  and  the  yellow  lamp -light.  A  ceaseless 
noise  of  snoring  was  in  the  air. 

He  got  up  and  walked  to  the  tank  of  ice-water 
at  the  end  of  the  aisle,  and  took  a  drink  from  the 
most  inaccessible  portion  of  the  common  tin-cup's 
rim.  The  happy  idea  of  going  out  on  the  platform 
struck  him,  and  he  acted  upon  it.  The  morning 
air  was  deliciously  cool  and  fresh  by  contrast,  and 
he  filled  his  lungs  with  it  again  and  again.  Stand 
ing  here,  he  could  discern  beyond  the  buildings  to 
the  right  the  faint  purplish  outlines  of  great 
rounded  hills.  Some  workmen,  one  of  them  bear 
ing  a  torch,  were  crouching  along  under  the  side 
of  the  train,  pounding  upon  the  resonant  wheels 
with  small  hammers.  He  recalled  having  heard 
the  same  sound  in  the  watches  of  the  night,  during 
a  prolonged  halt.  Some  one  had  said  it  was  Al 
bany.  He  smiled  in  spite  of  himself  at  the  thought 
that  Bishop  Sanderson  would  never  know  about 
the  visit  he  had  missed. 

Swinging  himself  to  the  ground,  he  bent  side- 
wise  and  looked  forward  down  the  long  train. 
There  were  five,  six,  perhaps  more,  sleeping-cars 
on  in  front.  Which  one  of  them,  he  wondered  — 
and  then  there  came  the  sharp  "  All  aboard !  " 

45° 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

from  the  other  side,  and  he  bundled  up  the  steps 
again,  and  entered  the  car  as  the  train  slowly 
resumed  its  progress. 

He  was  wide-awake  now,  and  quite  at  his  ease. 
He  took  his  seat,  and  diverted  himself  by  winking 
gravely  at  a  little  child  facing  him  on  the  next  seat 
but  one.  There  were  four  other  children  in  the 
family  party,  encamped  about  the  tired  and  still 
sleeping  mother  whose  back  was  turned  to  Theron. 
He  recalled  now  having  noticed  this  poor  woman 
last  night,  in  the  first  stage  of  his  journey,  — how  she 
fed  her  brood  from  one  of  the  numerous  baskets 
piled  under  their  feet,  and  brought  water  in  a  tin 
dish  of  her  own  from  the  tank  to  use  in  washing 
their  faces  with  a  rag,  and  loosened  their  clothes 
to  dispose  them  for  the  night's  sleep.  The  face  of 
the  woman,  her  manner  and  slatternly  aspect,  and 
the  general  effect  of  her  belongings,  bespoke 
squalid  ignorance  and  poverty.  Watching  her, 
Theron  had  felt  curiously  interested  in  the  per 
formance.  In  one  sense,  it  was  scarcely  more 
human  than  the  spectacle  of  a  cat  licking  her 
kittens,  or  a  cow  giving  suck  to  her  calf.  Yet, 
in  another,  was  there  anything  more  human? 

The  child  who  had  wakened  before  the  rest  re 
garded  him  with  placidity,  declining  to  be  amused 
by  his  winkings,  but  exhibiting  no  other  emotion. 
She  had  been  playing  by  herself  with  a  couple  of 
buttons  tied  on  a  string,  and  after  giving  a  civil 
amount  of  attention  to  Theron's  grimaces,  she 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

turned  again  to  the  superior  attractions  of  this  toy. 
Her  self-possession,  her  capacity  for  self-entertain 
ment,  the  care  she  took  not  to  arouse  the  others, 
all  impressed  him  very  much.  He  felt  in  his 
pocket  for  a  small  coin,  and,  reaching  forward, 
offered  it  to  her.  She  took  it  calmly,  bestowed  a 
tranquil  gaze  upon  him  for  a  moment,  and  went 
back  to  the  buttons.  Her  indifference  produced 
an  unpleasant  sensation  upon  him  somehow,  and 
he  rubbed  the  steaming  window  clear  again,  and 
stared  out  of  it. 

The  wide  river  lay  before  him,  flanked  by  a  pre 
cipitous  wall  of  cliffs  which  he  knew  instantly  must 
be  the  Palisades.  There  was  an  advertisement 
painted  on  them  which  he  tried  in  vain  to  read. 
He  was  surprised  to  find  they  interested  him  so 
slightly.  He  had  heard  all  his  life  of  the  Hudson, 
and  especially  of  it  just  at  this  point.  The  reality 
seemed  to  him  almost  commonplace.  His  failure 
to  be  thrilled  depressed  him  for  the  moment. 

"I  suppose  those  are  the  Palisades?  "  he  asked 
his  neighbor. 

The  man  glanced  up  from  his  paper,  nodded, 
and  made  as  if  to  resume  his  reading.  But  his 
eye  had  caught  something  in  the  prospect  through 
the  window  which  arrested  his  attention.  "By 
George  !  "  he  exclaimed,  and  lifted  himself  to  get 
a  clearer  view. 

"What  is  it?"  asked  Theron,  peering  forth  as 
well. 

452 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  Nothing ;  only  Barclay  Wendover's  yacht  is 
still  there.  There  's  been  a  hitch  of  some  sort. 
They  were  to  have  left  yesterday." 

"Is  that  it,  —  that  long  black  thing?  "  queried 
Theron.  "That  can't  be  a  yacht,  can  it?  " 

"What  do  you  think  it  is?"  answered  the 
other.  They  were  looking  at  a  slim,  narrow  hull, 
lying  at  anchor,  silent  and  motionless  on  the  drab 
expanse  of  water.  "  If  that  ain't  a  yacht,  they 
have  n't  begun  building  any  yet.  They  're  taking 
her  over  to  the  Mediterranean  for  a  cruise,  you 
know,  —  around  India  and  Japan  for  the  winter, 
and  home  by  the  South  Sea  islands.  Friend  o' 
mine 's  in  the  party.  Wouldn't  mind  the  trip 
myself." 

"  But  do  you  mean  to  say,"  asked  Theron, 
"that  that  little  shell  of  a  thing  can  sail  across 
the  ocean?  Why,  how  many  people  would  she 
hold?" 

The  man  laughed.  "  Well,"  he  said,  "  there  's 
room  for  two  sets  of  quadrilles  in  the  chief  saloon, 
if  the  rest  keep  their  legs  well  up  on  the  sofas. 
But  there  's  only  ten  or  a  dozen  in  the  party  this 
time.  More  than  that  rather  get  in  one  another's 
way,  especially  with  so  many  ladies  on  board." 

Theron  asked  no  more  questions,  but  bent  his 
head  to  see  the  last  of  this  wonderful  craft.  The 
sight  of  it,  and  what  he  had  heard  about  it,  sud 
denly  gave  point  and  focus  to  his  thoughts.  He 
knew  at  last  what  it  was  that  had  lurked,  formless 

453 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

and  undesignated,  these  many  days  in  the  back 
ground  of  his  dreams.  The  picture  rose  in  his 
mind  now  of  Celia  as  the  mistress  of  a  yacht. 
He  could  see  her  reclining  in  a  low  easy-chair 
upon  the  polished  deck,  with  the  big  white  sails 
billowing  behind  her,  and  the  sun  shining  upon 
the  deep  blue  waves,  and  glistening  through  the 
splash  of  spray  in  the  air,  and  weaving  a  halo 
of  glowing  gold  about  her  fair  head.  Ah,  how 
the  tender  visions  crowded  now  upon  him ! 
Eternal  summer  basked  round  this  enchanted  yacht 
of  his  fancy,  —  summer  sought  now  in  Scottish 
firths  or  Norwegian  fiords,  now  in  quaint  old 
Southern  harbors,  ablaze  with  the  hues  of  strange 
costumes  and  half-tropical  flowers  and  fruits,  now 
in  far-away  Oriental  bays  and  lagoons,  or  among 
the  coral  reefs  and  palm-trees  of  the  luxurious 
Pacific.  He  dwelt  upon  these  new  imaginings  with 
the  fervent  longing  of  an  inland-born  boy.  Every 
vague  yearning  he  had  ever  felt  toward  salt-water 
stirred  again  in  his  blood  at  the  thought  of  the 
sea  —  with  Celia. 

Why  not?  She  had  never  visited  any  foreign 
land.  "  Sometime,"  she  had  said,  "  sometime,  no 
doubt  I  will."  He  could  hear  again  the  wistful, 
musing  tone  of  her  voice.  The  thought  had  fas 
cinations  for  her,  it  was  clear.  How  irresistibly 
would  it  not  appeal  to  her,  presented  with  the 
added  charm  of  a  roving,  vagrant  independence 
on  the  high  seas,  free  to  speed  in  her  snow-winged 

454 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

chariot  wherever  she  willed  over  the  deep,  loitering 
in  this  place,  or  up-helm-and-away  to  another,  with 
no  more  care  or  weight  of  responsibility  than  the 
gulls  tossing  through  the  air  in  her  wake  ! 

Theron  felt,  rather  than  phrased  to  himself,  that 
there  would  not  be  "  ten  or  a  dozen  in  the  party" 
on  that  yacht.  Without  defining  anything  in  his 
mind,  he  breathed  in  fancy  the  same  bold  ocean 
breeze  which  filled  the  sails,  and  toyed  with  Celia's 
hair ;  he  looked  with  her  as  she  sat  by  the  rail, 
and  saw  the  same  waves  racing  past,  the  same  vast 
dome  of  cloud  and  ether  that  were  mirrored  in 
her  brown  eyes,  and  there  was  no  one  else  any 
where  near  them.  Even  the  men  in  sailors' 
clothes,  who  would  be  pulling  at  ropes,  or  climbing 
up  tarred  ladders,  kept  themselves  considerately 
outside  the  picture.  Only  Celia  sat  there,  and  at 
her  feet,  gazing  up  again  into  her  face  as  in  the 
forest,  the  man  whose  whole  being  had  been 
consecrated  to  her  service,  her  worship,  by  the 
kiss. 

"  You  Ve  passed  it  now.  I  was  trying  to  point 
out  the  Jumel  house  to  you,  —  where  Aaron  Burr 
lived,  you  know." 

Theron  roused  himself  from  his  day-dream,  and 
nodded  with  a  confused  smile  at  his  neighbor. 
"  Thanks,"  he  faltered  ;  "  I  didn't  hear  you.  The 
train  makes  such  a  noise,  and  I  must  have  been 
dozing." 

He  looked  about  him.     The  night  aspect,  as  of 

455 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

a  tramps'  lodging-house,  had  quite  disappeared 
from  the  car.  Everybody  was  sitting  up  ;  and  the 
more  impatient  were  beginning  to  collect  their 
bundles  and  hand-bags  from  the  racks  and  floor. 
An  expressman  came  through,  jangling  a  huge 
bunch  of  brass  checks  on  leathern  thongs  over  his 
arm,  and  held  parley  with  passengers  along  the 
aisle.  Outside,  citified  streets,  with  stores  and 
factories,  were  alternating  in  the  moving  panorama 
with  open  fields ;  and,  even  as  he  looked,  these 
vacant  spaces  ceased  altogether,  and  successive 
regular  lines  of  pavement,  between  two  tall  rows  of 
houses  all  alike,  began  to  stretch  out,  wheel  to  the 
right,  and  swing  off  out  of  view,  for  all  the  world 
like  the  avenues  of  hop-poles  he  remembered  as  a 
boy.  Then  was  a  long  tunnel,  its  darkness  broken 
at  stated  intervals  by  brief  bursts  of  daylight  from 
overhead,  and  out  of  this  all  at  once  the  train 
drew  up  its  full  length  in  some  vast,  vaguely  lighted 
enclosure,  and  stopped. 

"  Yes,  this  is  New  York,"  said  the  man,  folding 
up  his  paper,  and  springing  to  his  feet.  The 
narrow  aisle  was  filled  with  many  others  who  had 
been  prompter  still ;  and  Theron  stood,  bag  in 
hand,  waiting  till  this  energetic  throng  should  have 
pushed  itself  bodily  past  him  forth  from  the  car. 
Then  he  himself  made  his  way  out,  drifting  with 
a  sense  of  helplessness  in  their  resolute  wake. 
There  rose  in  his  mind  the  sudden  conviction  that 
he  would  be  too  late.  All  the  passengers  in  the 

456 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

forward  sleepers  would  be  gone  before  he  could 
get  there.  Yet  even  this  terror  gave  him  no  new 
power  to  get  ahead  of  anybody  else  in  the  tightly 
packed  throng. 

Once  on  the  broad  platform,  the  others  started 
off  briskly ;  they  all  seemed  to  know  just  where 
they  wanted  to  go,  and  to  feel  that  no  instant  of 
time  was  to  be  lost  in  getting  there.  Theron 
himself  caught  some  of  this  urgent  spirit,  and 
hurled  himself  along  in  the  throng  with  reckless 
haste,  knocking  his  bag  against  peoples'  legs,  but 
never  pausing  for  apology  or  comment  until  he 
found  himself  abreast  of  the  locomotive  at  the 
head  of  the  train.  He  drew  aside  from  the  main 
current  here,  and  began  searching  the  platform, 
far  and  near,  for  those  he  had  travelled  so  far 
to  find. 

The  platform  emptied  itself.  Theron  lingered 
on  in  puzzled  hesitation,  and  looked  about  him. 
In  the  whole  immense  station,  with  its  acres  of 
tracks  and  footways,  and  its  incessantly  shifting 
processions  of  people,  there  was  visible  nobody 
else  who  seemed  also  in  doubt,  or  who  appeared 
capable  of  sympathizing  with  indecision  in  any 
form.  Another  train  came  in,  some  way  over  to 
the  right,  and  before  it  had  fairly  stopped,  swarms 
of  eager  men  began  boiling  out  of  each  end  of 
each  car,  literally  precipitating  themselves  over  one 
another,  it  seemed  to  Theron,  in  their  excited 
dash  down  the  steps.  As  they  caught  their  foot- 

457 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ing  below,  they  started  racing  pell-mell  down  the 
platform  to  its  end ;  there  he  saw  them,  looking 
more  than  ever  like  clustered  bees  in  the  dis 
tance,  struggling  vehemently  in  a  dense  mass  up  a 
staircase  in  the  remote  corner  of  the  building. 

"What  are  those  folks  running  for?  Is  there  a 
fire?"  he  asked  an  amiable-faced  young  mulatto, 
in  the  uniform  of  the  sleeping-car  service,  who 
passed  him  with  some  light  hand-bags. 

"  No ;  they 's  Harlem  people,  I  guess  —  jes' 
catchin'  the  Elevated  —  that 's  all,  sir,"  he  an 
swered  obligingly. 

At  the  moment  some  passengers  emerged  slowly 
from  one  of  the  sleeping-cars,  and  came  loitering 
toward  him. 

"Why,  are  there  people  still  in  these  cars?"  he 
asked  eagerly.  "  Have  n't  they  all  gone  ?  " 

"  Some  has ;  some  ain't,"  the  porter  replied. 
"  They  most  generally  take  their  time  about  it. 
They  ain't  no  hurry,  so  long  's  they  get  out  'fore 
we  're  drawn  round  to  the  drill-yard." 

There  was  still  hope,  then.  Theron  took  up 
his  bag  and  walked  forward,  intent  upon  finding 
some  place  from  which  he  could  watch  unobserved 
the  belated  stragglers  issuing  from  the  sleeping- 
cars.  He  started  back  all  at  once,  confronted  by 
a  semi-circle  of  violent  men  with  whips  and 
badges,  who  stunned  his  hearing  by  a  sudden  vocif 
erous  outburst  of  shouts  and  yells.  They  made 
furious  gestures  at  him  with  their  whips  and  fists, 

458 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

to  enforce  the  incoherent  babel  of  their  voices ; 
and  in  these  gestures,  as  in  their  faces  and  cries, 
there  seemed  a  great  deal  of  menace  and  very 
little  invitation.  There  was  a  big  policeman 
sauntering  near  by,  and  Theron  got  the  idea  that 
it  was  his  presence  alone  which  protected  him  from 
open  violence  at  the  hands  of  these  savage  hack- 
men.  He  tightened  his  clutch  on  his  valise,  and, 
turning  his  back  on  them  and  their  uproar,  tried 
to  brave  it  out  and  stand  where  he  was.  But  the 
policeman  came  lounging  slowly  toward  him,  with 
such  authority  in  his  swaying  gait,  and  such  urban 
omniscience  written  all  over  his  broad,  sandy  face, 
that  he  lost  heart,  and  beat  an  abrupt  retreat  off  to 
the  right,  where  there  were  a  number  of  doorways, 
near  which  other  people  had  ventured  to  put  down 
baggage  on  the  floor. 

Here,  somewhat  screened  from  observation,  he 
stood  for  a  long  time,  watching  at  odd  moments 
the  ceaselessly  varying  phases  of  the  strange  scene 
about  him,  but  always  keeping  an  eye  on  the  train 
he  had  himself  arrived  in.  It  was  slow  and  dis 
piriting  work.  A  dozen  times  his  heart  failed  him, 
and  he  said  to  himself  mournfully  that  he  had  had 
his  journey  for  nothing.  Then  some  new  figure 
would  appear,  alighting  from  the  steps  of  a  sleeper, 
and  hope  revived  in  his  breast. 

At  last,  when  over  half  an  hour  of  expectancy 
had  been  marked  off  by  the  big  clock  overhead, 
his  suspense  came  to  an  end.  He  saw  Father 

459 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Forbes'  erect  and  substantial  form,  standing  on  the 
car  platform  nearest  of  all,  balancing  himself  with 
his  white  hands  on  the  rails,  waiting  for  something. 
Then  after  a  little  he  came  down,  followed  by  a 
black  porter,  whose  arms  were  burdened  by  nu 
merous  bags  and  parcels.  The  two  stood  a  minute 
or  so  more  in  hesitation  at  the  side  of  the  steps. 
Then  Celia  descended,  and  the  three  advanced. 

The  importance  of  not  being  discovered  was 
uppermost  in  Theron's  mind,  now  that  he  saw 
them  actually  coming  toward  him.  He  had  avoided 
this  the  previous  evening,  in  the  Octavius  depot, 
with  some  skill,  he  flattered  himself.  It  gave  him 
a  pleasurable  sense  of  being  a  man  of  affairs, 
almost  a  detective,  to  be  confronted  by  the  neces 
sity  now  of  baffling  observation  once  again.  He 
was  still  rather  without  plans  for  keeping  them  in 
view,  once  they  left  the  station.  He  had  supposed 
that  he  would  be  able  to  hear  what  hotel  they  di 
rected  their  driver  to  take  them  to,  and,  failing 
that,  he  had  fostered  a  notion,  based  upon  a  story 
he  had  read  when  a  boy,  of  throwing  himself  into 
another  carriage,  and  bidding  his  driver  to  pursue 
them  in  hot  haste,  and  on  his  life  not  fail  to 
track  them  down.  These  devices  seemed  some 
what  empty,  now  that  the  urgent  moment  was  at 
hand  j  and  as  he  drew  back  behind  some  other 
loiterers,  out  of  view,  he  sharply  racked  his  wits 
for  some  way  of  coping  with  this  most  pressing 
problem. 

460 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

It  turned  out,  however,  that  there  was  no  diffi 
culty  at  all.  Father  Forbes  and  Celia  seemed  to 
have  no  use  for  the  hackmen,  but  moved  straight 
forward  toward  the  street,  through  the  doorway 
next  to  that  in  which  Theron  cowered.  He  stole 
round,  and  followed  them  at  a  safe  distance,  mak 
ing  Celia's  hat,  and  the  portmanteau  perched  on 
the  shoulder  of  the  porter  behind  her,  his  guides. 
To  his  surprise,  they  still  kept  on  their  course 
when  they  had  reached  the  sidewalk,  and  went  over 
the  pavement  across  an  open  square  which  spread 
itself  directly  in  front  of  the  station.  Hanging  as 
far  behind  as  he  dared,  he  saw  them  pass  to  the 
other  sidewalk  diagonally  opposite,  proceed  for  a 
block  or  so  along  this,  and  then  separate  at  a  cor 
ner.  Celia  and  the  negro  lad  went  down  a  side 
street,  and  entered  the  door  of  a  vast,  tall  red 
brick  building  which  occupied  the  whole  block. 
The  priest,  turning  on  his  heel,  came  back  again 
and  went  boldly  up  the  broad  steps  of  the  front 
entrance  to  this  same  structure,  which  Theron  now 
discovered  to  be  the  Murray  Hill  Hotel. 

Fortune  had  indeed  favored  him.  He  not  only 
knew  where  they  were,  but  he  had  been  himself  a 
witness  to  the  furtive  way  in  which  they  entered 
the  house  by  different  doors.  Nothing  in  his  own 
limited  experience  of  hotels  helped  him  to  com 
prehend  the  notion  of  a  separate  entrance  for 
ladies  and  their  luggage.  He  did  not  feel  quite 
sure  about  the  significance  of  what  he  had  observed, 

461 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

in  his  own  mind.     But  it  was  apparent  to  him 
that  there  was  something  underhanded  about  it. 

After  lingering  awhile  on  the  steps  of  the  hotel, 
and  satisfying  himself  by  peeps  through  the  glass 
doors  that  the  coast  was  clear,  he  ventured  inside. 
The  great  corridor  contained  many  people,  coming, 
going,  or  standing  about,  but  none  of  them  paid 
any  attention  to  him.  At  last  he  made  up  his 
mind,  and  beckoned  a  colored  boy  to  him  from  a 
group  gathered  in  the  shadows  of  the  big  central 
staircase.  Explaining  that  he  did  not  at  that  mo 
ment  wish  a  room,  but  desired  to  leave  his  bag,  the 
boy  took  him  to  a  cloak-room,  and  got  him  a  check 
for  the  thing.  With  this  in  his  pocket  he  felt 
himself  more  at  his  ease,  and  turned  to  walk 
away.  Then  suddenly  he  wheeled,  and,  bend 
ing  his  body  over  the  counter  of  the  cloak-room, 
astonished  the  attendant  inside  by  the  eager 
ness  with  which  he  scrutinized  the  piled  rows  of 
portmanteaus,  trunks,  overcoats,  and  bundles  in 
the  little  enclosure. 

"  What  is  it  you  want  ?  Here  's  your  bag,  if 
you  're  looking  for  that,"  this  man  said  to  him. 

"No,  thanks;  it's  nothing,"  replied  Theron, 
straightening  himself  again.  He  had  had  a  narrow 
escape.  Father  Forbes  and  Celia,  walking  side  by 
side,  had  come  down  the  small  passage  in  which 
he  stood,  and  had  passed  him  so  closely  that  he 
had  felt  her  dress  brush  against  him.  Fortunately 
he  had  seen  them  in  time,  and  by  throwing  himself 

462 


half  into  the  cloak-room,  had  rendered  recognition 
impossible. 

He  walked  now  in  the  direction  they  had  taken, 
till  he  came  to  the  polite  colored  man  at  an  open 
door  on.  the  left,  who  was  bowing  people  into  the 
breakfast  room.  Standing  in  the  doorway,  he 
looked  about  him  till  his  eye  lighted  upon  his  two 
friends,  seated  at  a  small  table  by  a  distant  window, 
with  a  black  waiter,  card  in  hand,  bending  over  in 
consultation  with  them. 

Returning  to  the  corridor,  he  made  bold  now  to 
march  up  to  the  desk  and  examine  the  register. 
The  priest's  name  was  not  there.  He  found  only 
the  brief  entry,  "  Miss  Madden,  Octavius,"  written, 
not  by  her,  but  by  Father  Forbes.  On  the  line 
were  two  numbers  in  pencil,  with  an  "  and  "  be 
tween  them.  An  indirect  question  to  one  of  the 
clerks  helped  him  to  an  explanation  of  this.  When 
there  were  two  numbers,  it  meant  that  the  guest  in 
question  had  a  parlor  as  well  as  a  bedroom. 

Here  he  drew  a  long,  satisfied  breath,  and 
turned  away.  The  first  half  of  his  quest  stood 
completed,  —  and  that  much  more  fully  and  easily 
than  he  had  dared  to  hope.  He  could  not  but 
feel  a  certain  new  respect  for  himself  as  a  man  of 
resource  and  energy.  He  had  demonstrated  that 
people  could  not  fool  with  him  with  impunity. 

It  remained  to  decide  what  he  would  do  with 
his  discovery,  now  that  it  had  been  so  satisfactorily 
made.  As  yet,  he  had  given  this  hardly  a  thought. 

463 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Even  now,  it  did  not  thrust  itself  forward  as  a 
thing  demanding  instant  attention.  It  was  much 
more  important,  first  of  all,  to  get  a  good  break 
fast.  He  had  learned  that  there  was  another  and 
less  formal  eating-place,  downstairs  in  the  base 
ment  by  the  bar,  with  an  entrance  from  the  street. 
He  walked  down  by  the  inner  stairway  instead, 
feeling  himself  already  at  home  in  the  big  hotel. 
He  ordered  an  ample  breakfast,  and  came  out 
while  it  was  being  served  to  wash  and  have  his 
boots  blacked,  and  he  gave  the  man  a  quarter  of  a 
dollar.  His  pockets  were  filled  with  silver  quarters, 
half-dollars,  and  dollars  almost  to  a  burdensome 
point,  and  in  his  valise  was  a  bag  full  of  smaller 
change,  including  many  rolls  of  copper  cents 
which  Alice  always  counted  and  packed  up  on 
Mondays.  In  the  hurry  of  leaving  he  had  brought 
with  him  the  church  collections  for  the  past  two 
weeks.  It  occurred  to  him  that  he  must  keep  a 
strict  account  of  his  expenditure.  Meanwhile  he 
gave  ten  cents  to  another  man  in  a  silk- sleeved 
cardigan  jacket,  who  had  merely  stood  by  and 
looked  at  him  while  his  boots  were  being  polished. 
There  was  a  sense  of  metropolitan  affluence  in  the 
very  atmosphere. 

The  little  table  in  the  adjoining  room,  on  which 
Theron  found  his  meal  in  waiting  for  him,  seemed 
a  vision  of  delicate  napery  and  refined  appoint 
ments  in  his  eyes.  He  was  wolfishly  hungry,  and 
the  dishes  he  looked  upon  gave  him  back  assur- 

464 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ances  by  sight  and  smell  that  he  was  very  happy 
as  well.  The  servant  in  attendance  had  an  ex 
tremely  white  apron  and  a  kindly  black  face.  He 
bowed  when  Theron  looked  at  him,  with  the  air 
of  a  lifelong  admirer  and  humble  friend. 

"  I  suppose  you  '11  have  claret  with  your  break 
fast,  sir?"  he  remarked,  as  if  it  were  a  matter  of 
course. 

"Why,  certainly,"  answered  Theron,  stretching 
his  legs  contentedly  under  the  table,  and  tucking 
the  corner  of  his  napkin  in  his  neckband.  —  "  cer 
tainly,  my  good  man." 


3°  465 


CHAPTER  XXX 

AT  ten  o'clock  Theron,  loitering  near  the  book 
stall  in  the  corridor,  saw  Father  Forbes  come 
downstairs,  pass  out  through  the  big  front  doors, 
get  into  a  carriage,  and  drive  away. 

This  relieved  him  of  a  certain  sense  of  respon 
sibility,  and  he  retired  to  a  corner  sofa  and  sat 
down.  The  detective  side  of  him  being  off  duty, 
so  to  speak,  there  was  leisure  at  last  for  reflection 
upon  the  other  aspects  of  his  mission.  Yes ;  it  was 
high  time  for  him  to  consider  what  he  should  do 
next. 

It  was  easier  to  recognize  this  fact,  however, 
than  to  act  upon  it.  His  mind  was  full  of  tricksy 
devices  for  eluding  this  task  of  serious  thought 
which  he  sought  to  impose  upon  it.  It  seemed  so 
much  pleasanter  not  to  think  at  all  —  but  just  to 
drift.  He  found  himself  watching  with  envy  the 
men  who,  as  they  came  out  from  their  breakfast, 
walked  over  to  the  bookstall,  and  bought  cigars 
from  the  row  of  boxes  nestling  there  among  the 
newspaper  piles.  They  had  such  evident  delight 
in  the  work  of  selection ;  they  took  off  the  ends  of 
the  cigars  so  carefully,  and  lighted  them  with  such 

466 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

meditative  attention,  —  he  could  see  that  he  was 
wofully  handicapped  by  not  knowing  how  to  smoke. 
He  had  had  the  most  wonderful  breakfast  of  his 
life,  but  even  in  the  consciousness  of  comfortable 
repletion  which  pervaded  his  being,  there  was  an 
obstinate  sense  of  something  lacking.  No  doubt 
a  good  cigar  was  the  thing  needed  to  round  out 
the  perfection  of  such  a  breakfast.  He  half 
rose  once,  fired  by  a  sudden  resolution  to  go  over 
and  get  one.  But  of  course  that  was  nonsense  ;  it 
would  only  make  him  sick.  He  sat  down,  and 
determinedly  set  himself  to  thinking. 

The  effort  finally  brought  fruit  —  and  of  a  kind 
which  gave  him  a  very  unhappy  quarter  of  an 
hour.  The  lover  part  of  him  was  uppermost  now, 
insistently  exposing  all  its  raw  surfaces  to  the  stings 
and  scalds  of  jealousy.  Up  to  this  moment,  his 
brain  had  always  evaded  the  direct  question  of 
how  he  and  the  priest  relatively  stood  in  Celia's 
estimation.  It  forced  itself  remorselessly  upon 
him  now;  and  his  thoughts,  so  far  from  shirking 
the  subject,  seemed  to  rise  up  to  meet  it.  It  was 
extremely  unpleasant,  all  this. 

But  then  a  calmer  view  asserted  itself.  Why  go 
out  of  his  way  to  invent  anguish  for  himself?  The 
relations  between  Celia  and  the  priest,  whatever 
they  might  be,  were  certainly  of  old  standing. 
They  had  begun  before  his  time.  His  own 
romance  was  a  more  recent  affair,  and  must  take 
its  place,  of  course,  subject  to  existing  conditions. 

467 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

It  was  all  right  for  him  to  come  to  New  York,  and 
satisfy  his  legitimate  curiosity  as  to  the  exact 
character  and  scope  of  these  conditions.  But  it 
was  foolish  to  pretend  to  be  amazed  or  dismayed 
at  the  discovery  of  their  existence.  They  were  a 
part  of  the  situation  which  he,  with  his  eyes  wide 
open,  had  accepted.  It  was  his  function  to 
triumph  over  them,  to  supplant  them,  to  rear  the 
edifice  of  his  own  victorious  passion  upon  their 
ruins.  It  was  to  this  that  Celia's  kiss  had  invited 
him.  It  was  for  this  that  he  had  come  to  New 
York.  To  let  his  purpose  be  hampered  or 
thwarted  now  by  childish  doubts  and  jealousies 
would  be  ridiculous. 

He  rose,  and  holding  himself  very  erect,  walked 
with  measured  deliberation  across  the  corridor  and 
up  the  broad  staircase.  There  was  an  elevator 
near  at  hand,  he  had  noticed,  but  he  preferred  the 
stairs.  One  or  two  of  the  colored  boys  clustered 
about  the  foot  of  the  stairs  looked  at  him,  and  he 
had  a  moment  of  dreadful  apprehension  lest  they 
should  stop  his  progress.  Nothing  was  said,  and 
he  went  on.  The  numbers  on  the  first  floor  were 
not  what  he  wanted,  and  after  some  wandering 
about  he  ascended  to  the  next,  and  then  to  the 
third.  Every  now  and  then  he  encountered  at 
tendants,  but  intuitively  he  bore  himself  with  an 
air  of  knowing  what  he  was  about  which  protected 
him  from  inquiry. 

Finally  he  came  upon  the  hall-way  he  sought. 
468 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Passing  along,  he  found  the  doors  bearing  the 
numbers  he  had  memorized  so  well.  They  were 
quite  close  together,  and  there  was  nothing  to  help 
him  guess  which  belonged  to  the  parlor.  He  hesi 
tated,  gazing  wistfully  from  one  to  the  other.  In 
the  instant  of  indecision,  even  while  his  alert  ear 
caught  the  sound  of  feet  coming  along  toward  the 
passage  in  which  he  stood,  a  thought  came  to 
quicken  his  resolve.  It  became  apparent  to  him 
that  his  discovery  gave  him  a  certain  new  measure 
of  freedom  with  Celia,  a  sort  of  right  to  take  things 
more  for  granted  than  heretofore.  He  chose  a  door 
at  random,  and  rapped  distinctly  on  the  panel. 

"  Come  ! " 

The  voice  he  knew  for  Celia's.  The  single  word, 
however,  recalled  the  usage  of  Father  Forbes,  which 
he  had  noted  more  than  once  at  the  pastorate, 
when  Maggie  had  knocked. 

He  straightened  his  shoulders,  took  his  hat  off, 
and  pushed  open  the  door.  It  was  the  parlor,  — 
a  room  of  sofas,  pianos,  big  easy-chairs,  and  luxuri 
ous  bric-a-brac.  A  tall  woman  was  walking  up  and 
down  in  it,  with  bowed  head.  Her  back  was  at 
the  moment  toward  him ;  and  he  looked  at  her, 
saying  to  himself  that  this  was  the  lady  of  his 
dreams,  the  enchantress  of  the  kiss,  the  woman 
who  loved  him  —  but  somehow  it  did  not  seem  to 
his  senses  to  be  Celia. 

She  turned,  and  moved  a  step  or  two  in  his  di 
rection  before  she  mechanically  lifted  her  eyes,  and 

469 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

saw  who  was  standing  in  her  doorway.  She  stopped 
short,  and  regarded  him.  Her  face  was  in  the 
shadow,  and  he  could  make  out  nothing  of  its 
expression,  save  that  there  was  a  general  effect 
of  gravity  about  it. 

"  I  cannot  receive  you,"  she  said.  "You  must 
go  away.  You  have  no  business  to  come  like  this 
without  sending  up  your  card." 

Theron  smiled  at  her.  The  notion  of  taking  in 
earnest  her  inhospitable  words  did  not  at  all  occur 
to  him.  He  could  see  now  that  her  face  had  vexed 
and  saddened  lines  upon  it,  and  the  sharpness  of 
her  tone  remained  in  his  ears.  But  he  smiled  again 
gently,  to  reassure  her. 

"  I  ought  to  have  sent  up  my  name,  I  know,"  he 
said,  "  but  I  could  n't  bear  to  wait.  I  just  saw 
your  name  on  the  register,  and  —  you  will  forgive 
me,  won't  you?  —  I  ran  to  you  at  once.  I  know 
you  won't  have  the  heart  to  send  me  away  !  " 

She  stood  where  she  had  halted,  her  arms  behind 
her,  looking  him  fixedly  in  the  face.  He  had  made 
a  movement  to  advance,  and  offer  his  hand  in 
greeting,  but  her  posture  checked  the  impulse. 
His  courage  began  to  falter  under  her  inspection. 

"Must  I  really  go  down  again?"  he  pleaded. 
"  It 's  a  crushing  penalty  to  suffer  for  such  a  little 
indiscretion.  I  was  so  excited  to  find  you  were 
here  —  I  never  stopped  to  think.  Don't  send  me 
away ;  please  don't !  " 

Celia  raised  her  head.     "  Well,  shut  the  door, 

47° 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARK 

then,"  she  said,  "  since  you  are  so  anxious  to  stay. 
You  would  have  done  much  better,  though,  very 
much  better  indeed,  to  have  taken  the  hint  and 
gone  away." 

"Will  you  shake  hands  with  me,  Celia?"  he 
asked  softly,  as  he  came  near  her. 

"  Sit  there,  please  !  "  she  made  answer,  indicating 
a  chair  in  the  middle  of  the  room.  He  obeyed 
her,  but  to  his  surprise,  instead  of  seating  herself 
as  well,  she  began  walking  up  and  down  the  length 
of  the  floor  again.  After  a  turn  or  two  she  stopped 
in  front  of  him,  and  looked  him  full  in  the  eye. 
The  light  from  the  windows  was  on  her  countenance 
now,  and  its  revelations  vaguely  troubled  him.  It 
was  a  Celia  he  had  never  seen  before  who  con 
fronted  him. 

"  I  am  much  occupied  by  other  matters,"  she 
said,  speaking  with  cold  impassivity,  "  but  still  I 
find  myself  curious  to  know  just  what  limits  you  set 
to  your  dishonesty." 

Theron  stared  up  at  her.  His  lips  quivered,  but 
no  speech  came  to  them.  If  this  was  all  merely 
fond  playfulness,  it  was  being  carried  to  a  heart- 
aching  point. 

"  I  saw  you  hiding  about  in  the  depot  at  home 
last  evening,"  she  went  on.  "  You  come  up  here, 
pretending  to  have  discovered  me  by  accident,  but 
I  saw  you  following  me  from  the  Grand  Central 
this  morning." 

"Yes,  I  did  both  these  things,"    said  Theron, 

47 1 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

boldly.  A  fine  bravery  tingled  in  his  veins  all  at 
once.  He  looked  into  her  face  and  found  the 
spirit  to  disregard  its  frowning  aspect.  "  Yes,  I 
did  them,"  he  repeated  defiantly.  "  That  is  not 
the  hundredth  part,  or  the  thousandth  part,  of  what 
I  would  do  for  your  sake.  I  have  got  way  beyond 
caring  for  any  consequences.  Position,  reputation, 
the  good  opinion  of  fools,  —  what  are  they  ?  Life 
itself,  —  what  does  it  amount  to  ?  Nothing  at  all  — 
with  you  in  the  balance  !  " 

"Yes  —  but  I  am  not  in  the  balance,"  observed 
Celia,  quietly.  "  That  is  where  you  have  made 
your  mistake." 

Theron  laid  aside  his  hat.  Women  were  curious 
creatures,  he  reflected.  Some  were  susceptible  to 
one  line  of  treatment,  some  to  another.  His  own 
reading  of  Celia  had  always  been  that  she  liked 
opposition,  of  a  smart,  rattling,  almost  cheeky,  sort. 
One  got  on  best  with  her  by  saying  bright  things. 
He  searched  his  brain  now  for  some  clever  quip 
that  would  strike  sparks  from  the  adamantine  mood 
which  for  the  moment  it  was  her  whim  to  assume. 
To  cover  the  process,  he  smiled  a  little.  Then  her 
beauty,  as  she  stood  before  him,  her  queenly  form 
clad  in  a  more  stiffly  fashionable  dress  than  he  had 
seen  her  wearing  before,  appealed  afresh  and  over 
whelmingly  to  him.  He  rose  to  his  feet. 

"  Have  you  forgotten  our  talk  in  the  woods  ?  " 
he  murmured  with  a  wooing  note.  "  Have  you 
forgotten  the  kiss  ? ' ' 

472 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

She  shook  her  head  calmly.  "  I  have  forgotten 
nothing." 

"  Then  why  play  with  me  so  cruelly  now  ?  "  he 
went  on,  in  a  voice  of  tender  deprecation.  "  I  know 
you  don't  mean  it,  but  all  the  same  it  bruises  my 
heart  a  little.  I  build  myself  so  wholly  upon  you, 
I  have  made  existence  itself  depend  so  completely 
upon  your  smile,  upon  a  soft  glance  in  your  eyes, 
that  when  they  are  not  there,  why,  I  suffer,  I  don't 
know  how  to  live  at  all.  So  be  kinder  to  me, 
Celia  ! " 

"  I  was  kinder,  as  you  call  it,  when  you  came 
in,"  she  replied.  "  I  told  you  to  go  away.  That 
was  pure  kindness,  —  more  kindness  than  you 
deserved." 

Theron  looked  at  his  hat,  where  it  stood  on  the 
carpet  by  his  feet.  He  felt  tears  coming  into  his 
eyes.  "  You  tell  me  that  you  remember,"  he  said, 
in  depressed  tones,  "and  yet  you  treat  me  like 
this  !  Perhaps  I  am  wrong.  No  doubt  it  is  my 
own  fault.  I  suppose  I  ought  not  to  have  come 
down  here  at  all." 

Celia  nodded  her  head  in  assent  to  this  view. 

"  But  I  swear  that  I  was  helpless  in  the  matter," 
he  burst  forth.  "  I  had  to  come  !  It  would  have 
been  literally  impossible  for  me  to  have  stayed  at 
home,  knowing  that  you  were  here,  and  knowing 
also  that  —  that  —  " 

"  Go  on  !  "  said  Celia,  thrusting  forth  her  under- 
lip  a  trifle,  and  hardening  still  further  the  gleam  in 

473 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

her  eye,  as  he  stumbled  over  his  sentence  and 
left  it  unfinished.  "  What  was  the  other  thing  that 
you  were  '  knowing '  ?  " 

"  Knowing,  —  "he  took  up  the  word  hesitat 
ingly,  —  "  knowing  that  life  would  be  insupportable 
to  me  if  I  could  not  be  near  you." 

She  curled  her  lip  at  him.  "  You  skated  over 
the  thin  spot  very  well,"  she  commented.  "  It 
was  on  the  tip  of  your  tongue  to  mention  the  fact 
that  Father  Forbes  came  with  me.  Oh,  I  can 
read  you  through  and  through,  Mr.  Ware." 

In  a  misty  way  Theron  felt  things  slipping  from 
his  grasp.  The  rising  moisture  blurred  his  eyes  as 
their  gaze  clung  to  Celia. 

"Then  if  you  do  read  me,"  he  protested,  "you 
must  know  how  utterly  my  heart  and  brain  are 
filled  with  you.  No  other  man  in  all  the  world 
can  yield  himself  so  absolutely  to  the  woman  he 
worships  as  I  can.  You  have  taken  possession  of 
me  so  wholly,  I  am  not  in  the  least  master  of 
myself  any  more.  I  don't  know  what  I  say  or 
what  I  do.  I  am  not  worthy  of  you,  I  know.  No 
man  alive  could  be  that.  But  no  one  else  will 
idolize  and  reverence  you  as  I  do.  Believe  me 
when  I  say  that,  Celia  !  And  how  can  you  blame 
me,  in  your  heart,  for  following  you?  Whither 
thou  goest,  I  will  go,  and  where  thou  lodgest  I 
will  lodge ;  thy  people  shall  be  my  people,  and 
thy  God  my  God;  where  thou  diest,  will  I  die, 
and  there  will  I  be  buried.  The  Lord  do  so  to 

474 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

me,  and  more  also,  if  aught  but  death  part  thee 
and  me  !  " 

Celia  shrugged  her  shoulders,  and  moved  a  few 
steps  away  from  him.  Something  like  despair 
seized  upon  him. 

"Surely,"  he  urged  with  passion,  —  "surely  I 
have  a  right  to  remind  you  of  the  kiss  !  " 

She  turned.  "  The  kiss,"  she  said  meditatively. 
"  Yes,  you  have  a  right  to  remind  me  of  it.  Oh, 
yes,  an  undoubted  right.  You  have  another  right 
too,  —  the  right  to  have  the  kiss  explained  to  you. 
It  was  of  the  good-bye  order.  It  signified  that  we 
were  n't  to  meet  again,  and  that  just  for  one  little 
moment  I  permitted  myself  to  be  sorry  for  you. 
That  was  all." 

He  held  himself  erect  under  the  incredible 
words,  and  gazed  blankly  at  her.  The  magnitude 
of  what  he  confronted  bewildered  him ;  his  mind 
was  incapable  of  taking  it  in.  "  You  mean  —  "he 
started  to  say,  and  then  stopped,  helplessly  staring 
into  her  face,  with  a  dropped  jaw.  It  was  too 
much  to  try  to  think  what  she  meant. 

A  little  side-thought  sprouted  in  the  confusion 
of  his  brain.  It  grew  until  it  spread  a  bitter 
smile  over  his  pale  face.  "  I  know  so  little  about 
kisses,"  he  said ;  "  I  am  such  a  greenhorn  at  that 
sort  of  thing.  You  should  have  had  pity  on  my 
inexperience,  and  told  me  just  what  brand  of  kiss 
it  was  I  was  getting.  Probably  I  ought  to  have 
been  able  to  distinguish,  but  you  see  I  was  brought 

475 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

up  in  the  country  —  on  a  farm.  They  don't  have 
kisses  in  assorted  varieties  there." 

She  bowed  her  head  slightly.  "Yes,  you  are 
entitled  to  say  that,"  she  assented.  "  I  was  to 
blame,  and  it  is  quite  fair  that  you  should  tell  me 
so.  You  spoke  of  your  inexperience,  your  inno 
cence.  That  was  why  I  kissed  you  in  saying 
good-bye.  It  was  in  memory  of  that  innocence  of 
yours,  to  which  you  yourself  had  been  busy  saying 
good-bye  ever  since  I  first  saw  you.  The  idea 
seemed  to  me  to  mean  something  at  the  moment. 
I  see  now  that  it  was  too  subtle.  I  do  not  usually 
err  on  that  side." 

Theron  kept  his  hold  upon  her  gaze,  as  if  it 
afforded  him  bodily  support.  He  felt  that  he 
ought  to  stoop  and  take  up  his  hat,  but  he  dared 
not  look  away  from  her.  "  Do  you  not  err  now, 
on  the  side  of  cruelty?  "  he  asked  her  piteously. 

It  seemed  for  the  instant  as  if  she  were  waver 
ing,  and  he  swiftly  thrust  forth  other  pleas.  "  I 
admit  that  I  did  wrong  to  follow  you  to  New  York. 
I  see  that  now.  But  it  was  an  offence  committed 
in  entire  good  faith.  Think  of  it,  Celia  !  I  have 
never  seen  you  since  that  day,  —  that  day  in  the 
woods.  I  have  waited  —  and  waited  —  with  no 
sign  from  you,  no  chance  of  seeing  you  at  all. 
Think  what  that  meant  to  me  !  Everything  in  the 
world  had  been  altered  for  me,  torn  up  by  the 
roots.  I  was  a  new  being,  plunged  into  a  new 
existence.  The  kiss  had  done  that.  But  until  I 

476 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

saw  you  again,  I  could  not  tell  whether  this  vast 
change  in  me  and  my  life  was  for  good  or  for  bad, 
—  whether  the  kiss  had  come  to  me  as  a  blessing 
or  a  curse.  The  suspense  was  killing  me,  Celia  ! 
That  is  why,  when  I  learned  that  you  were  coming 
here,  I  threw  everything  to  the  winds  and  followed 
you.  You  blame  me  for  it,  and  I  bow  my  head 
and  accept  the  blame.  But  are  you  justified  in 
punishing  me  so  terribly,  —  in  going  on  after 
I  have  confessed  my  error,  and  cutting  my 
heart  into  little  strips,  putting  me  to  death  by 
torture?" 

"  Sit  down,"  said  Celia,  with  a  softened  weari 
ness  in  her  voice.  She  seated  herself  in  front  of 
him  as  he  sank  into  his  chair  again.  "  I  don't 
want  to  give  you  unnecessary  pain,  but  you  have 
insisted  on  forcing  yourself  into  a  position  where 
there  isn't  anything  else  but  pain.  I  warned  you 
to  go  away,  but  you  wouldn't.  No  matter  how 
gently  I  may  try  to  explain  things  to  you,  you  are 
bound  to  get  nothing  but  suffering  out  of  the 
explanation.  Now  shall  I  still  go  on  ?  " 

He  inclined  his  head  in  token  of  assent,  and 
did  not  lift  it  again,  but  raised  toward  her  a  dis 
consolate  gaze  from  a  pallid,  drooping  face. 

"  It  is  all  in  a  single  word,  Mr.  Ware,"  she  pro 
ceeded,  in  low  tones.  "  I  speak  for  others  as  well 
as  myself,  mind  you,  —  we  find  that  you  are  a 
bore." 

Theron's   stiffened   countenance   remained  im- 

477 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

movable.  He  continued  to  stare  unblinkingly  up 
into  her  eyes. 

"  We  were  disposed  to  like  you  very  much  when 
we  first  knew  you,"  Celia  went  on.  "You  im 
pressed  us  as  an  innocent,  simple,  genuine  young 
character,  full  of  mother's  milk.  It  was  like  the 
smell  of  early  spring  in  the  country  to  come  in 
contact  with  you.  Your  honesty  of  nature,  your 
sincerity  in  that  absurd  religion  of  yours,  your 
general  naivete  of  mental  and  spiritual  get-up,  all 
pleased  us  a  great  deal.  We  thought  you  were 
going  to  be  a  real  acquisition." 

"Just  a  moment  —  whom  do  you  mean  by 
'we'?"  He  asked  the  question  calmly  enough, 
but  in  a  voice  with  an  effect  of  distance  in  it. 

"  It  may  not  be  necessary  to  enter  into  that," 
she  replied.  "  Let  me  go  on.  But  then  it  became 
apparent,  little  by  little,  that  we  had  misjudged 
you.  We  liked  you,  as  I  have  said,  because  you 
were  unsophisticated  and  delightfully  fresh  and 
natural.  Somehow  we  took  it  for  granted  you 
would  stay  so.  But  that  is  just  what  you  did  n't 
do,  —  just  what  you  had  n't  the  sense  to  try  to  do. 
Instead,  we  found  you  inflating  yourself  with  all 
sorts  of  egotisms  and  vanities.  We  found  you 
presuming  upon  the  friendships  which  had  been 
mistakenly  extended  to  you.  Do  you  want  in 
stances?  You  went  to  Dr.  Ledsmar's  house  that 
very  day  after  I  had  been  with  you  to  get  a  piano 
at  Thurston's,  and  tried  to  inveigle  him  into 

478 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

talking  scandal  about  me.  You  came  to  me  with 
tales  about  him.  You  went  to  Father  Forbes,  and 
sought  to  get  him  to  gossip  about  us  both.  Neither 
of  those  men  will  ever  ask  you  inside  his  house 
again.  But  that  is  only  one  part  of  it.  Your 
whole  mind  became  an  unpleasant  thing  to  con 
template.  You  thought  it  would  amuse  and  im 
press  us  to  hear  you  ridiculing  and  reviling  the 
people  of  your  church,  whose  money  supports  you, 
and  making  a  mock  of  the  things  they  believe  in, 
and  which  you  for  your  life  would  n't  dare  let  them 
know  you  didn't  believe  in.  You  talked  to  us 
slightingly  about  your  wife.  What  were  you  think 
ing  of,  not  to  comprehend  that  that  would  disgust 
us?  You  showed  me  once  —  do  you  remember? 

—  a  life  of  George  Sand  that  you  had  just  bought, 

—  bought  because   you   had  just  discovered  that 
she  had  an  unclean  side  to  her  life.     You  chuckled 
as   you   spoke  to  me  about  it,  and  you  were  for 
all  the  world  like  a  little  nasty  boy,  giggling  over 
something  dirty  that  older  people  had  learned  not 
to  notice.     These  are  merely  random  incidents. 
They  are  just  samples,  picked   hap-hazard,  of  the 
things  in  you  which  have  been  opening  our  eyes, 
little  by  little,  to  our  mistake.     I  can  understand 
that  all  the  while  you  really  fancied  that  you  were 
expanding,  growing,  in  all  directions.     What  you 
took  to  be  improvement  was  degeneration.     When 
you  thought  that  you  were  impressing  us  most  by 
your  smart  sayings  and  doings,  you  were  remind- 

479 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ing  us  most  of  the  fable  about  the  donkey  trying 
to  play  lap-dog.  And  it  was  n't  even  an  honest, 
straightforward  donkey  at  that !  " 

She  uttered  these  last  words  sorrowfully,  her 
hands  clasped  in  her  lap,  and  her  eyes  sinking  to 
the  floor.  A  silence  ensued.  Then  Theron 
reached  a  groping  hand  out  for  his  hat,  and,  rising, 
walked  with  a  lifeless,  automatic  step  to  the  door. 

He  had  it  half  open,  when  the  impossibility  of 
leaving  in  this  way  towered  suddenly  in  his  path 
and  overwhelmed  him.  He  slammed  the  door  to, 
and  turned  as  if  he  had  been  whirled  round  by 
some  mighty  wind.  He  came  toward  her,  with 
something  almost  menacing  in  the  vigor  of  his 
movements,  and  in  the  wild  look  upon  his  white, 
set  face.  Halting  before  her,  he  covered  the 
tailor-clad  figure,  the  coiled  red  hair,  the  upturned 
face  with  its  simulated  calm,  the  big  brown  eyes, 
the  rings  upon  the  clasped  fingers,  with  a  sweeping, 
comprehensive  glare  of  passion. 

"  This  is  what  you  have  done  to  me,  then  !  " 

His  voice  was  unrecognizable  in  his  own  ears,  — 
hoarse  and  broken,  but  with  a  fright-compelling 
something  in  it  which  stimulated  his  rage.  The 
horrible  notion  of  killing  her,  there  where  she  sat, 
spread  over  the  chaos  of  his  mind  with  an  effect 
of  unearthly  light,  —  red  and  abnormally  evil.  It 
was  like  that  first  devilish  radiance  ushering  in 
Creation,  of  which  the  first-fruit  was  Cain.  Why 
should  he  not  kill  her?  In  all  ages,  women  had 

480 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

been  slain  for  less.  Yes,  —  and  men  had  been 
hanged.  Something  rose  and  stuck  in  his  dry 
throat ;  and  as  he  swallowed  it  down,  the  sinister 
flare  of  murderous  fascination  died  suddenly  away 
into  darkness.  The  world  was  all  black  again,  — 
plunged  in  the  Egyptian  night  which  lay  upon  the 
face  of  the  deep  while  the  earth  was  yet  without 
form  and  void.  He  was  alone  on  it,  —  alone 
among  awful,  planetary  solitudes  which  crushed 
him. 

The  sight  of  Celia,  sitting  motionless  only  a 
pace  in  front  of  him,  was  plain  enough  to  his  eyes. 
It  was  an  illusion.  She  was  really  a  star,  many 
millions  of  miles  away.  These  things  were  hard  to 
understand ;  but  they  were  true,  none  the  less. 
People  seemed  to  be  about  him,  but  in  fact  he 
was  alone.  He  recalled  that  even  the  little  child 
in  the  car,  playing  with  those  two  buttons  on  a 
string,  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  him.  Take 
his  money,  yes  ;  take  all  he  would  give  her  —  but 
not  smile  at  him,  not  come  within  reach  of  him  ! 
Men  closed  the  doors  of  their  houses  against  him. 
The  universe  held  him  at  arm's  length  as  a 
nuisance. 

He  was  standing  with  one  knee  upon  a  sofa. 
Unconsciously  he  had  moved  round  to  the  side  of 
Celia  j  and  as  he  caught  the  effect  of  her  face  now 
in  profile,  memory-pictures  began  all  at  once 
building  themselves  in  his  brain,  —  pictures  of  her 
standing  in  the  darkened  room  of  the  cottage  of 
31  481 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

death,  declaiming  the  Confiteor ;  of  her  seated  at 
the  piano,  under  the  pure,  mellowed  candle-light ; 
of  her  leaning  her  chin  on  her  hands,  and  gazing 
meditatively  at  the  leafy  background  of  the  woods 
they  were  in ;  of  her  lying  back,  indolently  content, 
in  the  deck-chair  on  the  yacht  of  his  fancy,  —  that 
yacht  which  a  few  hours  before  had  seemed  so 
brilliantly  and  bewitchingly  real  to  him,  and  now 
• —  now  —  ! 

He  sank  in  a  heap  upon  the  couch,  and,  bury 
ing  his  face  among  its  cushions,  wept  and  groaned 
aloud.  His  collapse  was  absolute.  He  sobbed 
with  the  abandonment  of  one  who,  in  the  veritable 
presence  of  death,  lets  go  all  sense  of  relation  to  life. 

Presently  some  one  was  touching  him  on  the 
shoulder,  —  an  incisive,  pointed  touch,  —  and  he 
checked  himself,  and  lifted  his  face. 

"You  will  have  to  get  up,  and  present  some 
sort  of  an  appearance,  and  go  away  at  once," 
Celia  said  to  him  in  low,  rapid  tones.  "  Some 
gentlemen  are  at  the  door,  whom  I  have  been 
waiting  for." 

As  he  stupidly  sat  up  and  tried  to  collect  his 
faculties,  Celia  had  opened  the  door  and  admitted 
two  visitors.  The  foremost  was  Father  Forbes; 
and  he,  with  some  whispered,  smiling  words,  pre 
sented  to  her  his  companion,  a  tall,  robust,  florid 
man  of  middle-age,  with  a  frock-coat  and  a  gray 
mustache,  sharply  waxed.  The  three  spoke  for 
a  moment  together.  Then  the  priest's  wandering 

482 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

eye  suddenly  lighted  upon  the  figure  on  the  sofa. 
He  stared,  knitted  his  brows,  and  then  lifted  them 
in  inquiry  as  he  turned  to  Celia. 

"Poor  man!"  she  said  readily,  in  tones  loud 
enough  to  reach  Theron.  "  It  is  our  neighbor, 
Father,  the  Rev.  Mr.  Ware.  He  hit  upon  my 
name  in  the  register  quite  unexpectedly,  and  I 
had  him  come  up.  He  is  in  sore  distress,  —  a 
great  and  sudden  bereavement.  He  is  going  now. 
Won't  you  speak  to  him  in  the  hall,  —  a  few  words, 
Father?  It  would  please  him.  He  is  terribly 
depressed." 

The  words  had  drawn  Theron  to  his  feet,  as  by 
some  mechanical  process.  He  took  up  his  hat 
and  moved  dumbly  to  the  door.  It  seemed  to 
him  that  Celia  intended  offering  to  shake  hands ; 
but  he  went  past  her  with  only  some  confused 
exchange  of  glances  and  a  murmured  word  or 
two.  The  tall  stranger,  who  drew  aside  to  let  him 
pass,  had  acted  as  if  he  expected  to  be  introduced. 
Theron,  emerging  into  the  hall,  leaned  against  the 
wall  and  looked  dreamily  at  the  priest,  who  had 
stepped  out  with  him. 

"  I  am  very  sorry  to  learn  that  you  are  in 
trouble,  Mr.  Ware,"  Father  Forbes  said,  gently 
enough,  but  in  hurried  tones.  "  Miss  Madden  is 
also  in  trouble.  I  mentioned  to  you  that  her 
brother  had  got  into  a  serious  scrape.  I  have 
brought  my  old  friend,  General  Brady,  to  consult 
with  her  about  the  matter.  He  knows  all  the 

483 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

parties  concerned,  and  he  can  set  things  right  if 
anybody  can." 

"  It 's  a  mistake  about  me,  —  I  'm  not  in  any 
trouble  at  all,"  said  Theron.  "  I  just  dropped  in 
to  make  a  friendly  call." 

The  priest  glanced  sharply  at  him,  noting  with 
a  swift,  informed  scrutiny  how  he  sprawled  against 
the  wall,  and  what  vacuity  his  eyes  and  loosened 
lips  expressed. 

"Then  you  have  a  talent  for  the  inopportune 
amounting  to  positive  genius,"  said  Father  Forbes, 
with  a  stormy  smile. 

"Tell  me  this,  Father  Forbes,"  the  other  de 
manded,  with  impulsive  suddenness,  '"  is  it  true 
that  you  don't  want  me  in  your  house  again?  Is 
that  the  truth  or  not?" 

"The  truth  is  always  relative,  Mr.  Ware," 
replied  the  priest,  turning  away,  and  closing  the 
door  of  the  parlor  behind  him  with  a  decisive 
sound. 

Left  alone,  Theron  started  to  make  his  way 
downstairs.  He  found  his  legs  wavering  under 
him  and  making  zigzag  movements  of  their  own 
in  a  bewildering  fashion.  He  referred  this  at  first, 
in  an  outburst  of  fresh  despair,  to  the  effects  of 
his  great  grief.  Then,  as  he  held  tight  to  the 
banister  and  governed  his  descent  step  by  step,  it 
occurred  to  him  that  it  must  be  the  wine  he  had 
had  for  breakfast.  Upon  examination,  he  was  not 
so  unhappy,  after  all. 

484 


CHAPTER   XXXI 

AT  the  second  peal  of  the  door-bell,  Brother 
Soulsby  sat  up  in  bed.  It  was  still  pitch-dark,  and 
the  memory  of  the  first  ringing  fluttered  musically 
in  his  awakening  consciousness  as  a  part  of  some 
dream  he  had  been  having. 

"Who  the  deuce  can  that  be?  "  he  mused  aloud, 
in  querulous  resentment  at  the  interruption. 

"  Put  your  head  out  of  the  window,  and  ask," 
suggested  his  wife,  drowsily. 

The  bell-pull  scraped  violently  in  its  socket,  and 
a  third  outburst  of  shrill  reverberations  clamored 
through  the  silent  house. 

"  Whatever  you  do,  I  'd  do  it  before  he  yanked 
the  whole  thing  to  pieces,"  added  the  wife,  with 
more  decision. 

Brother  Soulsby  was  wide  awake  now.  He 
sprang  to  the  floor,  and,  groping  about  in  the 
obscurity,  began  drawing  on  some  of  his  clothes. 
He  rapped  on  the  window  during  the  process,  to 
show  that  the  house  was  astir,  and  a  minute  after 
ward  made  his  way  out  of  the  room  and  down  the 
stairs,  the  boards  creaking  under  his  stockinged 
feet  as  he  went. 

485 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Nearly  a  quarter  of  an  hour  passed  before  he 
returned.  Sister  Soulsby,  lying  in  sleepy  quies 
cence,  heard  vague  sounds  of  voices  at  the  front 
door,  and  did  not  feel  interested  enough  to  lift  her 
head  and  listen.  A  noise  of  footsteps  on  the  side 
walk  followed,  first  receding  from  the  door,  then 
turning  toward  it,  this  second  time  marking  the 
presence  of  more  than  one  person.  There  seemed 
in  this  the  implication  of  a  guest,  and  she  shook 
off  the  dozing  impulses  which  enveloped  her  facul 
ties,  and  waited  to  hear  more.  There  came  up, 
after  further  muttering  of  male  voices,  the  unde 
niable  chink  of  coins  striking  against  one  another. 
Then  more  footsteps,  the  resonant  slam  of  a  car 
riage  door  out  in  the  street,  the  grinding  of  wheels 
turning  on  the  frosty  road,  and  the  racket  of  a 
vehicle  and  horses  going  off  at  a  smart  pace  into 
the  night.  Somebody  had  come,  then.  She 
yawned  at  the  thought,  but  remained  well  awake, 
tracing  idly  in  her  mind,  as  various  slight  sounds 
rose  from  the  lower  floor,  the  different  things 
Soulsby  was  probably  doing.  Their  spare  room 
was  down  there,  directly  underneath,  but  curiously 
enough  no  one  seemed  to  enter  it.  The  faint 
murmur  of  conversation  which  from  time  to  time 
reached  her  came  from  the  parlor  instead.  At 
last  she  heard  her  husband's  soft  tread  coming  up 
the  staircase,  and  still  there  had  been  no  hint  of 
employing  the  guest-chamber.  What  could  he  be 
about?  she  wondered. 

486 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Brother  Soulsby  came  in,  bearing  a  small  lamp 
in  his  hand,  the  reddish  light  of  which,  flaring  up 
ward,  revealed  an  unlooked-for  display  of  amuse 
ment  on  his  thin,  beardless  face.  He  advanced  to 
the  bedside,  shading  the  glare  from  her  blinking 
eyes  with  his  palm,  and  grinned. 

"  A  thousand  guesses,  old  lady,"  he  said,  with  a 
dry  chuckle,  "  and  you  would  n't  have  a  ghost  of 
a  chance.  You  might  guess  till  Hades  froze  over 
seven  feet  thick,  and  still  you  would  n't  hit  it." 

She  sat  up  in  turn.  "  Good  gracious,  man," 
she  began,  "  you  don't  mean  —  "  Here  the  cheer 
ful  gleam  in  his  small  eyes  reassured  her,  and  she 
sighed  relief,  then  smiled  confusedly.  "  I  half 
thought,  just  for  the  minute,"  she  explained,  "it 
might  be  some  bounder  who  'd  come  East  to  try 
and  blackmail  me.  But  no,  who  is  it  —  and  what 
on  earth  have  you  done  with  him?  " 

Brother  Soulsby  cackled  in  merriment.  "  It 's 
Brother  Ware  of  Octavius,  out  on  a  little  bat,  all 
by  himself.  He  says  he  's  been  on  the  loose  only 
two  days ;  but  it  looks  more  like  a  fortnight." 

"  Our  Brother  Ware  ?  "  she  regarded  him  with 
open-eyed  surprise. 

"  Well,  yes,  I  suppose  he  's  our  Brother  Ware,  — 
some,"  returned  Soulsby,  genially.  "  He  seems  to 
think  so,  anyway." 

"  But  tell  me  about  it ! "  she  urged  eagerly. 
"What's  the  matter  with  him?  How  does  he 
explain  it?" 

487 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"Well,  he  explains  it  pretty  badly,  if  you  ask 
me/'  said  Soulsby,  with  a  droll,  joking  eye  and  a 
mock-serious  voice.  He  seated  himself  on  the 
side  of  the  bed,  facing  her,  and  still  considerately 
shielding  her  from  the  light  of  the  lamp  he  held. 
"But  don't  think  I  suggested  any  explanations. 
I  Ve  been  a  mother  myself.  He  's  merely  filled 
himself  up  to  the  neck  with  rum,  in  the  simple, 
ordinary,  good  old-fashioned  way.  That 's  all. 
What  is  there  to  explain  about  that?" 

She  looked  meditatively  at  him  for  a  time, 
shaking  her  head.  "No,  Soulsby,"  she  said 
gravely,  at  last.  "  This  is  n't  any  laughing  matter. 
You  may  be  sure  something  bad  has  happened,  to 
set  him  off  like  that.  I  'm  going  to  get  up  and 
dress  right  now.  What  time  is  it?" 

"  Now  don't  you  do  anything  of  the  sort,"  he 
urged  persuasively.  "  It  is  n't  five  o'clock ;  it  '11  be 
dark  for  nearly  an  hour  yet.  Just  you  turn  over, 
and  have  another  nap.  He  's  all  right.  I  put  him 
on  the  sofa,  with  the  buffalo  robe  round  him.  You  '11 
find  him  there,  safe  and  sound,  when  it 's  time  for 
white  folks  to  get  up.  You  know  how  it  breaks 
you  up  all  day,  not  to  get  your  full  sleep." 

"  I  don't  care  if  it  makes  me  look  as  old  as  the 
everlasting  hills,"  she  said.  "Can't  you  under 
stand,  Soulsby  ?  The  thing  worries  me,  —  gets  on 
my  nerves.  I  couldn't  close  an  eye,  if  I  tried. 
I  took  a  great  fancy  to  that  young  man.  I  told 
you  so  at  the  time." 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Soulsby  nodded,  and  turned  down  the  wick  of 
his  lamp  a  trifle.  "Yes,  I  know  you  did,"  he 
remarked  in  placidly  non-contentious  tones.  "  I 
can't  say  I  saw  much  in  him  myself,  but  I  daresay 
you  're  right."  There  followed  a  moment's  silence, 
during  which  he  experimented  in  turning  the  wick 
up  again.  "But,  anyway,"  he  went  on,  "there 
is  n't  anything  you  can  do.  He  '11  sleep  it  off,  and 
the  longer  he  's  left  alone  the  better.  It  is  n't  as 
if  we  had  a  hired  girl,  who  'd  come  down  and  find 
him  there,  and  give  the  whole  thing  away.  He  's 
fixed  up  there  perfectly  comfortable ;  and  when 
he  's  had  his  sleep  out,  and  wakes  up  on  his  own 
account,  he  '11  be  feeling  a  heap  better." 

The  argument  might  have  carried  conviction, 
but  on  the  instant  the  sound  of  footsteps  came  to 
them  from  the  room  below.  The  subdued  noise 
rose  regularly,  as  cf  one  pacing  to  and  fro. 

"  No,  Soulsby,  you  come  back  to  bed,  and  get 
your  sleep  out.  I'm  going  downstairs.  It's  no 
good  talking ;  I  'm  going." 

Brother  Soulsby  offered  no  further  opposition, 
either  by  talk  or  demeanor,  but  returned  con 
tentedly  to  bed,  pulling  the  comforter  over  his 
ears,  and  falling  into  the  slow,  measured  respiration 
of  tranquil  slumber  before  his  wife  was  ready  to 
leave  the  room. 

The  dim,  cold  gray  of  twilight  was  sifting  fur 
tively  through  the  lace  curtains  of  the  front  windows 
when  Mrs.  Soulsby,  lamp  in  hand,  entered  the 

489 


parlor.  She  confronted  a  figure  she  would  have 
hardly  recognized.  The  man  seemed  to  have 
been  submerged  in  a  bath  of  disgrace.  From  the 
crown  of  his  head  to  the  soles  of  his  feet,  every 
thing  about  him  was  altered,  distorted,  smeared 
with  an  intangible  effect  of  shame.  In  the  vague 
gloom  of  the  middle  distance,  between  lamp  and 
window,  she  noticed  that  his  shoulders  were 
crouched,  like  those  of  some  shambling  tramp. 
The  frowsy  shadows  of  a  stubble  beard  lay  on  his 
jaw  and  throat.  His  clothes  were  crumpled  and 
hung  awry;  his  boots  were  stained  with  mud. 
The  silk  hat  on  the  piano  told  its  battered  story 
with  dumb  eloquence. 

Lifting  the  lamp,  she  moved  forward  a  step, 
and  threw  its  light  upon  his  face.  A  little  groan 
sounded  involuntarily  upon  her  lips.  Out  of  a 
mask  of  unpleasant  features,  swollen  with  drink 
and  weighted  by  the  physical  craving  for  rest  and 
sleep,  there  stared  at  her  two  bloodshot  eyes, 
shining  with  the  wild  light  of  hysteria.  The  effect 
of  dishevelled  hair,  relaxed  muscles,  and  rough, 
half-bearded  lower  face  lent  to  these  eyes,  as  she 
caught  their  first  glance,  an  unnatural  glare.  The 
lamp  shook  in  her  hand  for  an  instant.  Then, 
ashamed  of  herself,  she  held  out  her  other  hand 
fearlessly  to  him. 

"Tell  me  all  about  it,  Theron,"  she  said  calmly, 
and  with  a  soothing,  motherly  intonation  in  her 
voice. 

490 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

He  did  not  take  the  hand  she  offered,  but 
suddenly,  with  a  wailing  moan,  cast  himself  on  his 
knees  at  her  feet.  He  was  so  tall  a  man  that  the 
movement  could  have  no  grace.  He  abased  his 
head  awkwardly,  to  bury  it  among  the  folds  of  the 
skirts  at  her  ankles.  She  stood  still  for  a  moment, 
looking  down  upon  him.  Then,  blowing  out  the 
light,  she  reached  over  and  set  the  smoking  lamp 
on  the  piano  near  by.  The  daylight  made  things 
distinguishable  in  a  wan,  uncertain  way,  throughout 
the  room. 

"  I  have  come  out  of  hell,  for  the  sake  of  hearing 
some  human  being  speak  to  me  like  that !  " 

The  thick  utterance  proceeded  in  a  muffled 
fashion  from  where  his  face  grovelled  against  her 
dress.  Its  despairing  accents  appealed  to  her,  but 
even  more  was  she  touched  by  the  ungainly  figure 
he  made,  sprawling  on  the  carpet. 

"Well,  since  you  are  out,  stay  out,"  she  an 
swered,  as  reassuringly  as  she  could.  "  But  get 
up  and  take  a  seat  here  beside  me,  like  a 
sensible  man,  and  tell  me  all  about  it.  Come  ! 
I  insist !  " 

In  obedience  to  her  tone,  and  the  sharp  tug  at 
his  shoulder  with  which  she  emphasized  it,  he  got 
slowly  to  his  feet,  and  listlessly  seated  himself  on 
the  sofa  to  which  she  pointed.  He  hung  his  head, 
and  began  catching  his  breath  with  a  periodical 
gasp,  half  hiccough,  half  sob. 

"  First  of  all,"  she  said,  in  her  brisk,  matter 

491 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

of-fact  manner,  "  don't  you  want  to  lie  down  there 
again,  and  have  me  tuck  you  up  snug  with  the 
buffalo  robe,  and  go  to  sleep  ?  That  would  be  the 
best  thing  you  could  do." 

He  shook  his  head  disconsolately,  from  side  to 
side.  "  I  can't !  "  he  groaned,  with  a  swifter  re 
currence  of  the  sob-like  convulsions.  "  I  'm  dying 
for  sleep,  but  I  'm  too  —  too  frightened  !  " 

"  Come,  I  '11  sit  beside  you  till  you  drop  off,"  she 
said,  with  masterful  decision.  He  suffered  himself 
to  be  pushed  into  recumbency  on  the  couch,  and 
put  his  head  with  docility  on  the  pillow  she  brought 
from  the  spare  room.  When  she  had  spread  the 
fur  over  him,  and  pushed  her  chair  close  to  the 
sofa,  she  stood  by  it  for  a  little,  looking  down  in 
meditation  at  his  demoralized  face.  Under  the 
painful  surface-blur  of  wretchedness  and  fatigued 
debauchery,  she  traced  reflectively  the  lineaments 
of  the  younger  and  cleanlier  countenance  she  had 
seen  a  few  months  before.  Nothing  essential  had 
been  taken  away.  There  was  only  this  pestiferous 
overlaying  of  shame  and  cowardice  to  be  removed. 
The  face  underneath  was  still  all  right. 

With  a  soft,  maternal  touch,  she  smoothed  the 
hair  from  his  forehead  into  order.  Then  she 
seated  herself,  and,  when  he  got  his  hand  out  from 
under  the  robe  and  thrust  it  forth  timidly,  she 
took  it  in  hers  and  held  it  in  a  warm,  sympathetic 
grasp.  He  closed  his  eyes  at  this,  and  gradually 
the  paroxysmal  catch  in  his  breathing  lapsed. 

492 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

The  daylight  strengthened,  until  at  last  tiny  flecks 
of  sunshine  twinkled  in  the  meshes  of  the  further 
curtains  at  the  window.  She  fancied  him  asleep, 
and  gently  sought  to  disengage  her  hand,  but  his 
fingers  clutched  at  it  with  vehemence,  and  his 
eyes  were  wide  open. 

"  I  can't  sleep  at  all,"  he  murmured.  "I  want 
to  talk." 

"  There  's  nothing  in  the  world  to  hinder  you," 
she  commented  smilingly. 

"I  tell  you  the  solemn  truth,"  he  said,  lift 
ing  his  voice  in  dogged  assertion  :  "  the  best  ser 
mon  I  ever  preached  in  my  life,  I  preached  only 
three  weeks  ago,  at  the  camp-meeting.  It  was 
admitted  by  everybody  to  be  far  and  away  my 
finest  effort !  They  will  tell  you  the  same  !  " 

"It's  quite  likely,"  assented  Sister  Soulsby. 
"  I  quite  believe  it." 

"  Then  how  can  anybody  say  that  I  Ve  degen 
erated,  that  I  Ve  become  a  fool?  "  he  demanded. 

"  I  have  n't  heard  anybody  hint  at  such  a 
thing,"  she  answered  quietly. 

"  No,  of  course,  you  have  n't  heard  them  !  "  he 
cried,  "/heard  them,  though  !"  Then,  forcing 
himself  to  a  sitting  posture,  against  the  restraint 
of  her  hand,  he  flung  back  the  covering.  "  I  'm 
burning  hot  already  !  Yes,  those  were  the  identi 
cal  words  :  I  have  n't  improved ;  I  Ve  degen 
erated.  People  hate  me ;  they  won't  have  me  in 
their  houses.  They  say  I  'm  a  nuisance  and  a  bore. 

493 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

I  'm  like  a  little  nasty  boy.  That 's  what  they  say. 
Even  a  young  man  who  was  dying  —  lying  right 
on  the  edge  of  his  open  grave  —  told  me  solemnly 
that  I  reminded  him  of  a  saint  once,  but  I  was 
only  fit  for  a  barkeeper  now.  They  say  I  really 
don't  know  anything  at  all.  And  I  'm  not  only  a 
fool,  they  say,  I  'm  a  dishonest  fool  into  the 
bargain  !  " 

"  But  who  says  such  twaddle  as  that?  "  she  re 
turned  consolingly.  The  violence  of  his  emotion 
disturbed  her.  "  You  must  n't  imagine  such 
things.  You  are  among  friends  here.  Other 
people  are  your  friends,  too.  They  have  the  very 
highest  opinion  of  you." 

"  I  have  n't  a  friend  on  earth  but  you  !  "  he 
declared  solemnly.  His  eyes  glowed  fiercely,  and 
his  voice  sank  into  a  grave  intensity  of  tone.  "  I 
was  going  to  kill  myself.  I  went  on  to  the  big 
bridge  to  throw  myself  off,  and  a  policeman  saw 
me  trying  to  climb  over  the  railing,  and  he  grabbed 
me  and  marched  me  away.  Then  he  threw  me 
out  at  the  entrance,  and  said  he  would  club  my 
head  off  if  I  came  there  again.  And  then  I  went 
and  stood  and  let  the  cable-cars  pass  close  by  me, 
and  twenty  times  I  thought  I  had  the  nerve  to 
throw  myself  under  the  next  one,  and  then  I  waited 
for  the  next  —  and  —  I  was  afraid  !  And  then  I 
was  in  a  crowd  somewhere,  and  the  warning  came 
to  me  that  I  was  going  to  die.  The  fool  need  n't 
go  kill  himself:  God  would  take  care  of  that.  It 

494 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

was  my  heart,  you  know.  I  Ve  had  that  terrible 
fluttering  once  before.  It  seized  me  this  time, 
and  I  fell  down  in  the  crowd,  and  some  people 
walked  over  me,  but  some  one  else  helped  me  up, 
and  let  me  sit  down  in  a  big  lighted  hallway,  the 
entrance  to  some  theatre,  and  some  one  brought 
me  some  brandy,  but  somebody  else  said  I  was 
drunk,  and  they  took  it  away  again,  and  put  me 
out.  They  could  see  I  was  a  fool,  that  I  had  n't 
a  friend  on  earth.  And  when  I  went  out,  there 
was  a  big  picture  of  a  woman  in  tights,  and  the 
word  '  Amazons'  overhead  —  and  then  I  remem 
bered  you.  I  knew  you  were  my  friend, —  the 
only  one  I  have  on  earth." 

"  It  is  very  flattering,  —  to  be  remembered  like 
that,"  said  Sister  Soulsby,  gently.  The  disposition 
to  laugh  was  smothered  by  a  pained  perception  of 
the  suffering  he  was  undergoing.  His  face  had 
grown  drawn  and  haggard  under  the  burden  of  his 
memories  as  he  rambled  on. 

"  So  I  came  straight  to  you,"  he  began  again. 
"  I  had  just  money  enough  left  to  pay  my  fare. 
The  rest  is  in  my  valise  at  the  hotel,  —  the  Murray 
Hill  Hotel.  It  belongs  to  the  church.  I  stole  it 
from  the  church.  When  I  am  dead  they  can  get 
it  back  again  !  " 

Sister  Soulsby  forced  a  smile  to  her  lips. 
"  What  nonsense  you  talk  —  about  dying  !  "  she 
exclaimed.  "Why,  man  alive,  you'll  sleep  this 
all  off  like  a  top,  if  you  '11  only  lie  down  and  give 

495 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

yourself  a  chance.     Come,  now,  you  must  do  as 
you  're  told." 

With  a  resolute  hand,  she  made  him  lie  down 
again,  and  once  more  covered  him  with  the  fur. 
He  submitted,  and  did  not  even  offer  to  put  out 
his  arm  this  time,  but  looked  in  piteous  dumbness 
at  her  for  a  long  time.  While  she  sat  thus  in  si 
lence,  the  sound  of  Brother  Soulsby  moving  about 
upstairs  became  audible. 

Theron  heard  it,  and  the  importance  of  hurry 
ing  on  some  further  disclosure  seemed  to  suggest 
itself.  "  I  can  see  you  think  I  'm  just  drunk,"  he 
said,  in  low,  sombre  tones.  "  Of  course  that 's 
what  he  thought.  The  hackman  thought  so,  and 
so  did  the  conductor,  and  everybody.  But  I 
hoped  you  would  know  better.  I  was  sure  you 
would  see  that  it  was  something  worse  than  that. 
See  here,  I  '11  tell  you.  Then  you  '11  understand. 
I  've  been  drinking  for  two  days  and  one  whole 
night,  on  my  feet  all  the  while,  wandering  alone 
in  that  big  strange  New  York,  going  through 
places  where  they  murdered  men  for  ten  cents, 
mixing  myself  up  with  the  worst  people  in  low 
bar-rooms  and  dance-houses,  and  they  saw  I  had 
money  in  my  pocket,  too,  —  and  yet  nobody 
touched  me,  or  offered  to  lay  a  finger  on  me.  Do 
you  know  why  ?  They  understood  that  I  wanted 
to  get  drunk,  and  couldn't.  The  Indians  won't 
harm  an  idiot,  or  lunatic,  you  know.  Well,  it  was 
the  same  with  these  vilest  of  the  vile.  They  saw 

496 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

that  I  was  a  fool  whom  God  had  taken  hold  of,  to 
break  his  heart  first,  and  then  to  craze  his  brain, 
and  then  to  fling  him  on  a  dunghill  to  die  like  a 
dog.  They  believe  in  God,  those  people.  They  're 
the  only  ones  who  do,  it  seems  to  me.  And  they 
wouldn't  interfere  when  they  saw  what  He  was 
doing  to  me.  But  I  tell  you  I  was  n't  drunk.  I 
have  n't  been  drunk.  I  'm  only  heart-broken,  and 
crushed  out  of  shape  and  life,  —  that 's  all.  And 
I  've  crawled  here  just  to  have  a  friend  by  me 
when  —  when  I  come  to  the  end." 

"  You  're  not  talking  very  sensibly,  or  very 
bravely  either,  Theron  Ware,"  remarked  his  com 
panion.  "  It 's  cowardly  to  give  way  to  notions 
like  that." 

"  Oh,  I  'm  not  afraid  to  die  ;  don't  think  that," 
he  remonstrated  wearily.  "If  there  is  a  Judg 
ment,  it  has  hit  me  as  hard  as  it  can  already. 
There  can't  be  any  hell  worse  than  that  I  've  gone 
through.  Here  I  am  talking  about  hell,"  he  con 
tinued,  with  a  pained  contraction  of  the  muscles 
about  his  mouth,  —  a  still-born,  malformed  smile, 
—  "  as  if  I  believed  in  one  !  I  Ve  got  way  through 
all  my  beliefs,  you  know.  I  tell  you  that 
frankly." 

"  It 's  none  of  my  business,"  she  reassured  him. 
"  I  'm  not  your  Bishop,  or  your  confessor.  I  'm 
just  your  friend,  your  pal,  that  's  all." 

"  Look  here  !  "  he  broke  in,  with  some  anima 
tion   and  a  new   intensity  of  glance  and   voice. 
3*  497 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  If  I  was  going  to  live,  I  'd  have  some  funny 
things  to  tell.  Six  months  ago  I  was  a  good  man. 
1  not  only  seemed  to  be  good,  to  others  and  to 
myself,  but  I  was  good.  I  had  a  soul ;  I  had  a 
conscience.  I  was  going  along  doing  my  duty,  and 
I  was  happy  in  it.  We  were  poor,  Alice  and  I, 
and  people  behaved  rather  hard  toward  us,  and 
sometimes  we  were  a  little  down  in  the  mouth 
about  it ;  but  that  was  all.  We  really  were  happy ; 
and  I,  —  I  really  was  a  good  man.  Here  's  the 
kind  of  joke  God  plays  !  You  see  me  here  six 
months  after.  Look  at  me  !  I  have  n't  got  an 
honest  hair  in  my  head.  I  'm  a  bad  man  through 
and  through,  that 's  what  I  am.  I  look  all  around 
at  myself,  and  there  is  n't  an  atom  left  anywhere 
of  the  good  man  I  used  to  be.  And,  mind  you, 
I  never  lifted  a  finger  to  prevent  the  change.  I 
did  n't  resist  once ;  I  did  n't  make  any  fight.  I 
just  walked  deliberately  down-hill,  with  my  eyes 
wide  open.  I  told  myself  all  the  while  that  I  was 
climbing  up-hill  instead,  but  I  knew  in  my  heart 
that  it  was  a  lie.  Everything  about  me  was  a  lie. 
I  wouldn't  be  telling  the  truth,  even  now,  if  —  if 
I  had  n't  come  to  the  end  of  my  rope.  Now,  how 
do  you  explain  that  ?  How  can  it  be  explained  ? 
Was  I  really  rotten  to  the  core  all  the  time,  years 
ago,  when  I  seemed  to  everybody,  myself  and  the 
rest,  to  be  good  and  straight  and  sincere  ?  Was  it 
all  a  sham,  or  does  God  take  a  good  man  and  turn 
him  into  an  out-and-out  bad  one,  in  just  a  few 

498 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

months,  —  in  the  time  that  it  takes  an  ear  of  corn  to 
form  and  ripen  and  go  off  with  the  mildew  ?  Or  is  n't 
there  any  God  at  all,  —  but  only  men  who  live  and 
die  like  animals?  And  that  would  explain  my 
case,  wouldn't  it?  I  got  bitten  and  went  vicious 
and  crazy,  and  they  've  had  to  chase  me  out  and 
hunt  me  to  my  death  like  a  mad  dog  !  Yes,  that 
makes  it  all  very  simple.  It  is  n't  worth  while  to 
discuss  me  at  all  as  if  I  had  a  soul,  is  it  ?  I  'm 
just  one  more  mongrel  cur  that 's  gone  mad,  and 
must  be  put  out  of  the  way.  That 's  all." 

"  See  here,"  said  Sister  Soulsby,  alertly,  "  I  half 
believe  that  a  good  cuffing  is  what  you  really  stand 
in  need  of.  Now  you  stop  all  this  nonsense,  and 
lie  quiet  and  keep  still !  Do  you  hear  me?  " 

The  jocose  sternness  which  she  assumed,  in 
words  and  manner,  seemed  to  soothe  him.  He 
almost  smiled  up  at  her  in  a  melancholy  way,  and 
sighed  profoundly. 

"  I  Ve  told  you  my  religion  before,"  she  went  on 
with  gentleness.  "  The  sheep  and  the  goats  are 
to  be  separated  on  Judgment  Day,  but  not  a  min 
ute  sooner.  In  other  words,  as  long  as  human  life 
lasts,  good,  bad,  and  indifferent  are  all  braided  up 
together  in  every  man's  nature,  and  every  woman's 
too.  You  were  n't  altogether  good  a  year  ago,  any 
more  than  you  're  altogether  bad  now.  You  were 
some  of  both  then  ;  you  're  some  of  both  now.  If 
you  've  been  making  an  extra  sort  of  fool  of  your 
self  lately,  why,  now  that  you  recognize  it,  the  only 

499 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

thing  to  do  is  to  slow  steam,  pull  up,  and  back 
engine  in  the  other  direction.  In  that  way  you  '11 
find  things  will  even  themselves  up.  It 's  a  see 
saw  with  all  of  us,  Theron  Ware,  —  sometimes  up ; 
sometimes  down.  But  nobody  is  rotten  clear  to 
the  core." 

He  closed  his  eyes,  and  lay  in  silence  for  a  time. 

"  This  is  what  day  of  the  week?"  he  asked,  at 
last. 

"  Friday,  the  nineteenth." 

"  Wednesday,  —  that  would  be  the  seventeenth. 
That  was  the  day  ordained  for  my  slaughter.  On 
that  morning,  I  was  the  happiest  man  in  the  world. 
No  king  could  have  been  so  proud  and  confident 
as  I  was.  A  wonderful  romance  had  come  to  me. 
The  most  beautiful  young  woman  in  the  world,  the 
most  talented  too,  was  waiting  for  me.  An  ex 
press  train  was  carrying  me  to  her,  and  it  could  n't 
go  fast  enough  to  keep  up  with  my  eagerness. 
She  was  very  rich,  and  she  loved  me,  and  we  were 
to  live  in  eternal  summer,  wherever  we  liked,  on  a 
big,  beautiful  yacht.  No  one  else  had  such  a  life 
before  him  as  that.  It  seemed  almost  too  good 
for  me,  but  I  thought  I  had  grown  and  developed 
so  much  that  perhaps  I  would  be  worthy  of  it. 
Oh,  how  happy  I  was  !  I  tell  you  this  because  —  be 
cause  you  are  not  like  the  others.  You  will  under 
stand." 

"  Yes,  I  understand,"  she  said  patiently.  "  Well 
—  you  were  being  so  happy." 

500 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

"  That  was  in  the  morning,  —  Wednesday  the 
seventeenth,  —  early  in  the  morning.  There  was  a 
little  girl  in  the  car,  playing  with  some  buttons, 
and  when  I  tried  to  make  friends  with  her,  she 
looked  at  me,  and  she  saw,  right  at  a  glance,  that 
I  was  a  fool.  '  Out  of  the  mouths  of  babes  and 
sucklings,'  you  know.  She  was  the  first  to  find  it 
out.  It  began  like  that,  early  in  the  morning. 
But  then  after  that  everybody  knew  it.  They  had 
only  to  look  at  me  and  they  said  :  '  Why,  this  is  a 
fool,  —  like  a  little  nasty  boy ;  we  won't  let  him 
into  our  houses ;  we  find  him  a  bore.'  That  is 
what  they  said." 

"  Did  she  say  it?  "  Sister  Soulsby  permitted  her 
self  to  ask. 

For  answer  Theron  bit  his  lips,  and  drew  his 
chin  under  the  fur,  and  pushed  his  scowling  face 
into  the  pillow.  The  spasmodic,  sob-like  gasps 
began  to  shake  him  again.  She  laid  a  compas 
sionate  hand  upon  his  hot  brow. 

"  That  is  why  I  made  my  way  here  to  you,"  he 
groaned  piteously.  "I  knew  you  would  sympa 
thize  ;  I  could  tell  it  all  to  you.  And  it  was  so 
awful,  to  die  there  alone  in  the  strange  city  —  I 
could  n't  do  it  —  with  nobody  near  me  who  liked 
me,  or  thought  well  of  me.  Alice  would  hate  me. 
There  was  no  one  but  you.  I  wanted  to  be  with 
you  —  at  the  last." 

His  quavering  voice  broke  off  in  a  gust  of  weep 
ing,  and  his  face  frankly  surrendered  itself  to  the 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

distortions  of  a  crying  child's  countenance,  wide- 
mouthed  and  tragically  grotesque  in  its  abandon 
ment  of  control. 

Sister  Soulsby,  as  her  husband's  boots  were 
heard  descending  the  stairs,  rose,  and  drew  the 
robe  up  to  half  cover  his  agonized  visage.  She 
patted  the  sufferer  softly  on  the  head,  and  then 
went  to  the  stair-door. 

"  I  think  he  '11  go  to  sleep  now,"  she  said,  lifting 
her  voice  to  the  new-comer,  and  with  a  backward 
nod  toward  the  couch.  "Come  out  into  the 
kitchen  while  I  get  breakfast,  or  into  the  sitting- 
room,  or  somewhere,  so  as  not  to  disturb  him. 
He  's  promised  me  to  lie  perfectly  quiet,  and  try 
to  sleep." 

When  they  had  passed  together  out  of  the  room, 
she  turned.  "  Soulsby,"  she  said  with  half-playful 
asperity,  "  I  'm  disappointed  in  you.  For  a  man 
who  's  knocked  about  as  much  as  you  have,  I  must 
say  you  Ve  picked  up  an  astonishingly  small  outfit 
of  gumption.  That  poor  creature  in  there  is  no 
more  drunk  than  I  am.  He  's  been  drinking,  — 
yes,  drinking  like  a  fish  ;  but  it  was  n't  able  to  make 
him  drunk.  He  's  past  being  drunk ;  he  's  grief- 
crazy.  It 's  a  case  of  '  woman.'  Some  girl  has 
made  a  fool  of  him,  and  decoyed  him  up  in  a  bal 
loon,  and  let  him  drop.  He  's  been  hurt  bad,  too." 

"  We  have  all  been  hurt  in  our  day  and  genera 
tion,"  responded  Brother  Soulsby,  genially.  "  Don't 
you  worry ;  he  '11  sleep  that  off,  too.  It  takes 

502 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

longer  than  drink,  and  it  does  n't  begin  to  be  so 
pleasant,  but  it  can  be  slept  off.  Take  my  word 
for  it,  he  '11  be  a  different  man  by  noon." 

When  noon  came,  however,  Brother  Soulsby  was 
on  his  way  to  summon  one  of  the  village  doctors. 
Toward  nightfall,,  he  went  out  again  to  telegraph 
for  Alice. 


503 


CHAPTER  XXXII 

SPRING  fell  early  upon  the  pleasant  southern 
slopes  of  the  Susquehanna  country.  The  snow 
went  off  as  by  magic.  The  trees  budded  and 
leaved  before  their  time.  The  birds  came  and 
set  up  their  chorus  in  the  elms,  while  winter 
seemed  still  a  thing  of  yesterday. 

Alice,  clad  gravely  in  black,  stood  again  upon  a 
kitchen-stoop,  and  looked  across  an  intervening 
space  of  back-yards  and  fences  to  where  the  tall 
boughs,  fresh  in  their  new  verdure,  were  silhou 
etted  against  the  pure  blue  sky.  The  prospect 
recalled  to  her  irresistibly  another  sunlit  morning, 
a  year  ago,  when  she  had  stood  in  the  doorway  of 
her  own  kitchen,  and  surveyed  a  scene  not  unlike 
this ;  it  might  have  been  with  the  same  carolling 
robins,  the  same  trees,  the  same  azure  segment  of 
the  tranquil,  speckless  dome.  Then  she  was  look 
ing  out  upon  surroundings  novel  and  strange  to 
her,  among  which  she  must  make  herself  at  home 
as  best  she  could.  But  at  least  the  ground  was 
secure  under  her  feet ;  at  least  she  had  a  home, 
and  a  word  from  her  lips  could  summon  her 
husband  out,  to  stand  beside  her  with  his  arm 

5°4 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

about  her,  and  share  her  buoyant,  hopeful  joy  in 
the  promises  of  spring. 

To  think  that  that  was  only  one  little  year  ago, 
—  the  mere  revolution  of  four  brief  seasons  !  And 
now  ! 

Sister  Soulsby,  wiping  her  hands  on  her  apron, 
came  briskly  out  upon  the  stoop.  Some  cheerful 
commonplace  was  on  her  tongue,  but  a  glance  at 
Alice's  wistful  face  kept  it  back.  She  passed  an 
arm  around  her  waist  instead,  and  stood  in  silence, 
looking  at  the  elms. 

"It  brings  back  memories  to  me,  —  all  this," 
said  Alice,  nodding  her  head,  and  not  seeking  to 
dissemble  the  tears  which  sprang  to  her  eyes. 

"The  men  will  be  down  in  a  minute,  dear,"  the 
other  reminded  her.  "  They  'd  nearly  finished 
packing  before  I  put  the  biscuits  in  the  oven.  We 
must  n't  wear  long  faces  before  folks,  you  know." 

"  Yes,  I  know,"  murmured  Alice.  Then,  with  a 
sudden  impulse,  she  turned  to  her  companion. 
"  Candace,"  she  said  fervently,  "  we  're  alone  here 
for  the  moment ;  I  must  tell  you  that  if  I  don't 
talk  gratitude  to  you,  it 's  simply  and  solely  because 
I  don't  know  where  to  begin,  or  what  to  say.  I'  m 
just  dumfounded  at  your  goodness.  It  takes  my 
speech  away.  I  only  know  this,  Candace  :  God 
will  be  very  good  to  you." 

"  Tut !  tut !  "  replied  Sister  Soulsby,  "  that 's  all 
right,  you  dear  thing.  I  know  just  how  you  feel. 
Don't  dream  of  being  under  obligation  to  explain 

505 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

it  to  me,  or  to  thank  us  at  all.  We  Ve  had  all 
sorts  of  comfort  out  of  the  thing,  —  Soulsby  and  I. 
We  used  to  get  downright  lonesome,  here  all  by 
ourselves,  and  we  Ve  simply  had  a  winter  of  pleas 
ant  company  instead,  that 's  all.  Besides,  there  's 
solid  satisfaction  in  knowing  that  at  last,  for  once 
in  our  lives,  we  Ve  had  a  chance  to  be  of  some 
real  use  to  somebody  who  truly  needed  it.  You 
can't  imagine  how  stuck  up  that  makes  us  in  our 
own  conceit.  We  feel  as  if  we  were  George  Pea- 
body  and  Lady  Burdett-Coutts,  and  several  other 
philanthropists  thrown  in.  No,  seriously,  don't 
think  of  it  again.  We  're  glad  to  have  been  able 
to  do  it  all ;  and  if  you  only  go  ahead  now,  and 
prosper  and  be  happy,  why,  that  will  be  the  only 
reward  we  want." 

"  I  hope  we  shall  do  well,"  said  Alice.  "  Only 
tell  me  this,  Candace.  You  do  think  I  was  right, 
don't  you,  in  insisting  on  Theron's  leaving  the  minis 
try  altogether  ?  He  seems  convinced  enough  now 
that  it  was  the  right  thing  to  do ;  but  I  grow 
nervous  sometimes  lest  he  should  find  it  harder 
than  he  thought  to  get  along  in  business,  and  regret 
the  change  —  and  blame  me." 

"  I  think  you  may  rest  easy  in  your  mind  about 
that,"  the  other  responded.  "  Whatever  else  he 
does,  he  will  never  want  to  come  within  gunshot 
of  a  pulpit  again.  It  came  too  near  murdering  him 
for  that." 

Alice   looked   at   her  doubtfully.     "  Something 

506 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

came  near  murdering  him,  I  know.  But  it  does  n't 
seem  to  me  that  I  would  say  it  was  the  ministry. 
And  I  guess  you  know  pretty  well  yourself  what  it 
was.  Of  course,  I  've  never  asked  any  questions, 
and  I  've  hushed  up  everybody  at  Octavius  who 
tried  to  quiz  me  about  it,  —  his  disappearance  and 
my  packing  up  and  leaving,  and  all  that  —  and  I  've 
never  discussed  the  question  with  you  —  but  —  " 

"  No,  and  there  's  no  good  going  into  it  now," 
put  in  Sister  Soulsby,  with  amiable  decisiveness. 
"  It 's  all  past  and  gone.  In  fact,  I  hardly  remem 
ber  much  about  it  now  myself.  He  simply  got  into 
deep  water,  poor  soul,  and  we  Ve  floated  him  out 
again,  safe  and  sound.  That 's  all.  But  all  the 
same,  I  was  right  in  what  I  said.  He  was  a  mis 
take  in  the  ministry." 

"  But  if  you  'd  known  him  in  previous  years," 
urged  Alice,  plaintively,  "  before  we  were  sent  to 
that  awful  Octavius.  He  was  the  very  ideal  of  all 
a  young  minister  should  be.  People  used  to  simply 
worship  him,  he  was  such  a  perfect  preacher,  and 
so  pure-minded  and  friendly  with  everybody,  and 
threw  himself  into  his  work  so.  It  was  all  that 
miserable,  contemptible  Octavius  that  did  the 
mischief." 

Sister  Soulsby  slowly  shook  her  head.  "  If  there 
had  n't  been  a  screw  loose  somewhere,"  she  said 
gently,  "  Octavius  would  n't  have  hurt  him.  No, 
take  my  word  for  it,  he  never  was  the  right  man  for 
the  place.  He  seemed  to  be,  no  doubt,  but  he 

507 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

was  n't.  When  pressure  was  put  on  him,  it  found  out 
his  weak  spot  like  a  shot,  and  pushed  on  it,  and  — 
well,  it  came  near  smashing  him,  that 's  all." 

"  And  do  you  think  he  '11  always  be  a  —  a  back 
slider,"  mourned  Alice. 

"  For  mercy's  sake,  don't  ever  try  to  have  him 
pretend  to  be  anything  else  !  "  exclaimed  the  other. 
"  The  last  state  of  that  man  would  be  worse  than 
the  first.  You  must  make  up  your  mind  to  that. 
And  you  must  n't  show  that  you  're  nervous  about 
it.  You  must  n't  get  nervous  !  You  must  n't  be 
afraid  of  things.  Just  you  keep  a  stiff  upper  lip, 
and  say  you  will  get  along,  you  will  be  happy. 
That 's  your  only  chance,  Alice.  He  is  n't  going 
to  be  an  angel  of  light,  or  a  saint,  or  anything  of 
that  sort,  and  it 's  no  good  expecting  it.  But  he  '11 
be  just  an  average  kind  of  man,  —  a  little  sore  about 
some  things,  a  little  wiser  than  he  was  about  some 
others.  You  can  get  along  perfectly  with  him,  if 
you  only  keep  your  courage  up,  and  don't  show 
the  white  feather." 

"  Yes,  I  know ;  but  I  Ve  had  it  pretty  well  taken 
out  of  me,"  commented  Alice.  "It  used  to  come 
easy  to  me  to  be  cheerful  and  resolute  and  all  that ; 
but  it 's  different  now." 

Sister  Soulsby  stole  a  swift  glance  at  the  unsus 
pecting  face  of  her  companion  which  was  not  all 
admiration,  but  her  voice  remained  patiently  affec 
tionate.  "  Oh,  that  '11  all  come  back  to  you,  right 
enough.  You  '11  have  your  hands  full,  you  know, 

508 


finding  a  house,  and  unpacking  all  your  old  furni 
ture,  and  buying  new  things,  and  getting  your  home 
settled.  It  '11  keep  you  so  busy  you  won't  have 
time  to  feel  strange  or  lonesome,  one  bit.  You  '11 
see  how  it  '11  tone  you  up.  In  a  year's  time  you 
won't  know  yourself  in  the  looking-glass." 

"  Oh,  my  health  is  good  enough,"  said  Alice ; 
"  but  I  can't  help  thinking,  suppose  Theron  should 
be  taken  sick  again,  away  out  there  among  strangers. 
You  know  he  's  never  appeared  to  me  to  have  quite 
got  his  strength  back.  These  long  illnesses,  you 
know,  they  always  leave  a  mark  on  a  man." 

"  Nonsense  !  He  's  strong  as  an  ox,"  insisted 
Sister  Soulsby.  "  You  mark  my  word,  he  '11  thrive 
in  Seattle  like  a  green  bay-tree." 

"  Seattle  !  "  echoed  Alice,  meditatively.  "  It 
sounds  like  the  other  end  of  the  world,  does  n't  it?  " 

The  noise  of  feet  in  the  house  broke  upon  the 
colloquy,  and  the  women  went  indoors,  to  join  the 
breakfast  party.  During  the  meal,  it  was  Brother 
Soulsby  who  bore  the  burden  of  the  conversation. 
He  was  full  of  the  future  of  Seattle  and  the  mag 
nificent  impending  development  of  that  Pacific 
section.  He  had  been  out  there,  years  ago,  when 
it  was  next  door  to  uninhabited.  He  had  visited 
the  district  twice  since,  and  the  changes  discover 
able  each  new  time  were  more  wonderful  than  any 
thing  Aladdin's  lamp  ever  wrought.  He  had  secured 
for  Theron,  through  some  of  his  friends  in  Port 
land,  the  superintendency  of  a  land  and  real  estate 

5°9 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

company,  which  had  its  headquarters  in  Seattle, 
but  ambitiously  linked  its  affairs  with  the  future  of 
all  Washington  Territory.  In  an  hour's  time  the 
hack  would  come  to  take  the  Wares  and  their  bag 
gage  to  the  depot,  the  first  stage  in  their  long 
journey  across  the  continent  to  their  new  home. 
Brother  Soulsby  amiably  filled  the  interval  with 
reminiscences  of  the  Oregon  of  twenty  years  back, 
with  instructive  dissertations  upon  the  soil,  climate, 
and  seasons  of  Puget  Sound  and  the  Columbia 
valley,  and,  above  all,  with  helpful  characterizations 
of  the  social  life  which  had  begun  to  take  form  in 
this  remotest  West.  He  had  nothing  but  confi 
dence,  to  all  appearances,  in  the  success  of  his 
young  friend,  now  embarking  on  this  new  career. 
He  seemed  so  sanguine  about  it  that  the  whole 
atmosphere  of  the  breakfast  room  lightened  up, 
and  the  parting  meal,  surrounded  by  so  many 
temptations  to  distraught  breedings  and  silences  as 
it  was,  became  almost  jovial  in  its  spirit. 

At  last,  it  was  time  to  look  for  the  carriage. 
The  trunks  and  hand-bags  were  ready  in  the  hall, 
and  Sister  Soulsby  was  tying  up  a  package  of  sand 
wiches  for  Alice  to  keep  by  her  in  the  train. 

Theron,  with  hat  in  hand,  and  overcoat  on  arm, 
loitered  restlessly  into  the  kitchen,  and  watched 
this  proceeding  for  a  moment.  Then  he  sauntered 
out  upon  the  stoop,  and,  lifting  his  head  and  draw 
ing  as  long  a  breath  as  he  could,  looked  over  at 
the  elms. 

510 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

Perhaps  the  face  v/as  older  and  graver ;  it  was 
hard  to  tell.  The  long  winter's  illness,  with  its 
recurring  crises  and  sustained  confinement,  had 
bleached  his  skin  and  reduced  his  figure  to  gaunt- 
ness,  but  there  was  none  the  less  an  air  of  restored 
and  secure  good  health  about  him.  Only  in  the 
eyes  themselves,  as  they  rested  briefly  upon  the 
prospect,  did  a  substantial  change  suggest  itself. 
They  did  not  dwell  fondly  upon  the  picture  of  the 
lofty,  spreading  boughs,  with  their  waves  of  sap- 
green  leafage  stirring  against  the  blue.  They  did 
not  soften  and  glow  this  time,  at  the  thought  of 
how  wholly  one  felt  sure  of  God's  goodness  in 
these  wonderful  new  mornings  of  spring. 

They  looked  instead  straight  through  the  fairest 
and  most  moving  spectacle  in  nature's  proces 
sional,  and  saw  afar  off,  in  conjectural  vision,  a 
formless  sort  of  place  which  was  Seattle.  They 
surveyed  its  impalpable  outlines,  its  undefined 
dimensions,  with  a  certain  cool  glitter  of  hard-and- 
fast  resolve.  There  rose  before  his  fancy,  out  of 
the  chaos  of  these  shapeless  imaginings,  some 
faces  of  men,  then  more  behind  them,  then  a  great 
concourse  of  uplifted  countenances,  crowded  close 
together  as  far  as  the  eye  could  reach.  They  were 
attentive  faces  all,  rapt,  eager,  credulous  to  a  de 
gree.  Their  eyes  were  admiringly  bent  upon  a 
common  object  of  excited  interest.  They  were 
looking  at  him;  they  strained  their  ears  to  miss 
no  cadence  of  his  voice.  Involuntarily  he  straight- 

5" 


THE  DAMNATION  OF  THERON  WARE 

ened  himself,  stretched  forth  his  hand  with  the 
pale,  thin  fingers  gracefully  disposed,  and  passed 
it  slowly  before  him  from  side  to  side,  in  a  com 
prehensive,  stately  gesture.  The  audience  rose  at 
him,  as  he  dropped  his  hand,  and  filled  his  day 
dream  with  a  mighty  roar  of  applause,  in  volume 
like  an  ocean  tempest,  yet  pitched  for  his  hearing 
alone. 

He  smiled,  shook  himself  with  a  little  delighted 
tremor,  and  turned  on  the  stoop  to  the  open  door. 

"  What  Soulsby  said  about  politics  out  there 
interested  me  enormously,"  he  remarked  to  the 
two  women.  "  I  should  n't  be  surprised  if  I  found 
myself  doing  something  in  that  line.  I  can  speak, 
you  know,  if  I  can't  do  anything  else.  Talk  is 
what  tells,  these  days.  Who  knows?  I  may  turn 
up  in  Washington  a  full-blown  senator  before  I  'm 
forty.  Stranger  things  have  happened  than  that, 
out  West !  " 

"  We  '11  come  down  and  visit  you  then,  Soulsby 
and  I,"  said  Sister  Soulsby,  cheerfully.  "You 
shall  take  us  to  the  White  House,  Alice,  and  in 
troduce  us." 

"  Oh,  it  isn't  likely /would  come  East,"  said 
Alice,  pensively.  "  Most  probably  I  'd  be  left  to 
amuse  myself  in  Seattle.  But  there  —  I  think 
that 's  the  carriage  driving  up  to  the  door." 

THE   END. 


512 


MINTED  AT  THE  UNIVERSITY  PRESS, 
IN  CAMBRIDGE,  MASSACHUSETTS, 
FOR  STONE  AND  KIM  BALL,  PUBLISH 
ERS,  NEW  YORK,  M  DCCC  ZCTI 


1  i-4' 


THE  UNIVERSITY  LIBRARY 
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URNED 
JUN  2  2  1994 

Santa  Cruz  Jitney 


PS1707.D2  1897 


3  2106  00206  8606 


